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Published on the Foundation 
Established in Memory of 

HERBERT A. SCHEFTEL 

Of the Class of 1898, Yale College 



A BOOK OF VERSE OF THE 

GREAT WAR 



i^ 



EDITED BY 



W/ REGINALD WHEELER 

WITH A FOREWORD BY 
CHARLTON M. LEWIS 






NEW HAVEN: 

YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 

MDCCCCXVII 



4'^ 



Copyright, 1917 
By Yale University Press 



First published, November, 1917 



NOV 17 1917 






THE HERBERT A. SCHEFTEL 
MEMORIAL PUBLICATION FUND 

The present volume is the third work pubHshed on the 
Herbert A. Scheftel Memorial Publication Fund. 
This foundation was established January 12, 1915, 
by the widow of Herbert A. Scheftel, of the Class of 
1898, Yale College, who died September 12, 1914- 
The gift was made ''in recognition of the affection in 
which he always held Yale and in order to perpetuate 
in the University the memory of his particular interest 
in the work of the Yale University Press." 



COPYRIGHT NOTICE 

All rights on poems in this work are reserved by the holders 
of the copyright. The publishers and others named in the 
subjoined list are the proprietors, either in their own right or 
as agents for the authors, of the books and poems of which 
the authorship and titles are given respectively, and of which 
the ownership is thus specifically noted and is hereby acknowl- 
edged. 

Publishers of A Book of Verse of the Great War. 191 7. 

Richard G. Badger, Boston— Edith M. Thomas: The 

Woman's Cry (from "The White Messenger"). 
Barse & Hopkins, New York — Robert W. Service: On the 

Wire (from "Rhymes of a Red Cross Man"). 
J. & J. Bennett, London— Hardy: Song of the Soldiers (from 

"Pro Patria et Rege"). 
Boston Evening Transcript, Boston — Josephine Preston 

Peabody: Men Have Wings at Last, Harvest Moon, 19 14 

(from "Harvest Moon") ; Marion Couthouy Smith: Sainte 

Jeanne of France, 1915. 
Boston News Bureau, Boston — Bartholomew F. Griffin: 

The Other Army. 
Braithwaite, Anthology of American Magazine Verse — 

James Oppenheim: 191 5 — by permission of the author. 
British Review, London — Katharine Tynan: In War-time, 

A Night Piece. 

[ vii ] 



COPYRIGHT NOTICE 



Century Magazine, New York — ^Louis Untermeyer: The 
Victory of the Beet Fields. 

J. Clarke & Co., London — Cecil Roberts: Watchmen of the 
Night, Chant of Dead Warriors (from "Collected War 
Poems") — by permission of the author. 

Constable and Company, London — Alan Seeger: I Have a 
Rendezvous with Death. 

George H. Doran Co., New York — Charles Hanson Towne: 
To My Country (from "Today and Tomorrow")^ — ^by 
permission of the author. 

E. P. DuTTON & Company, New York— W. M. Letts: The 
Call to Arms in Our Streets, The Spires of Oxford. 

Everybody's Magazine, New York — Charles Hanson Towne: 
To My Country. 

Laurence J. Gomme, New York — Clinton Scollard: The Vale 
of Shadows, The Madonna of Tremonde, In France 
(from "The Vale of Shadows and Other Verses of the 
Great War"). 

Good Housekeeping Magazine, New York — Margaret Wid- 
demer: The Old Road to Paradise — ^by permission of the 
author. 

Harper & Brothers, New York — Dana Burnet: The Plaint 
of Pan, Storm, The Forge of God, Christmas in the 
Trenches (from "Poems by Dana Burnet"). 

William Heinemann, London — Sarojini Naidu: The Gift of 
India (from "The Broken Wing"); R. E. Vernede: Eng- 
land to the Sea (from "War Poems"). 

Houghton Mifflin Co., Boston — ^Laurence Binyon: Strange 
Fruit (from "The Winnowing Fan"); Gilbert Frankau: 
The Voice of the Slaves, Gun-Teams, Eyes in the Air, The 
Voice of the Guns (from "A Song of the Guns"); Jose- 
phine Preston Peabody: Harvest Moon, 1914 (from "Har- 
vest Moon") . 

[ viii ] 



COPYRIGHT NOTICE 



Mitchell Kennerley, New York — ^William Samuel Johnson: 
Prayer for Peace (from "Prayer for Peace and Other 
Poems"). 

John Lane Company, New York — Dominique Bonnard: 
Bells of Flanders; Rupert Brooke: Sonnets: — I. Peace, 
III. The Dead, IV. The Dead, V. The Soldier (from 
"Collected Poems") ; Emile Cammaerts: A Voice in the 
Desert, To the Great King of a Little Country, The Blind 
Man and His Son, The Belgian Flag, Song of the Belgians 
(from "Collected Poems"); Sarojini Naidu: The Gift of 
India (from "The Broken Wing"); Stephen Phillips: 
Women and War (from "Panama and Other Poems"). 

John Lane Company, London — Emile Cammaerts: A Voice 
in the Desert, To the Great King of a Little Country, The 
Blind Man and His Son, The Belgian Flag, Song of the 
Belgians (from "Collected Poems"). 

T. Werner Laurie, Ltd., London — Edgar Lee Masters: O 
Glorious France! 

Life, New York — Christopher Morley: Kitchener. 

London Daily Mail, London — ^Alfred Noyes: A Prayer in 
Time of War. 

Elkin Mathews, London — ^Laurence Binyon: Strange Fruit 
(from "The Winnowing Fan"); Wilfrid Wilson Gibson: 
The Father, Mad, Raining (from "Battle and Other 
Poems"). 

John Murray, London — Sir Henry Newbolt: The Vigil — by 
permission of the author. 

New Weekly, London — John Freeman: The Stars in Their 
Courses — by permission of the author. 

New York American, New York — Queen Margherita: Italian 
Soldiers. 

New York Evening Post, New York — Edith M. Thomas: 
The Woman's Cry. 

Cix] 



COPYRIGHT NOTICE 



New York Evening Sun, New York — Edmond Rostand: 
The Cathedral of Rheims. 

Poetry, A Magazine of Verse, Chicago — Amy Lowell: The 
Bombardment. 

G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York — ^Maurice Hewlett: A Sing- 
song of England (from "Gai Saber"). 

Reedy's Mirror, St. Louis — ^William Rose Benet: The Red 
Country. 

Saturday Review, London — Ada Tyrrell: My Son. 

Scribner's Magazine, New York — Olive Tilford Dargan: 
Beyond War; Edward Forrester Sutton: The Drum, The 
Pipes of the North. 

Scribner's Sons, New York — ^Alan Seeger: I Have a Ren- 
dezvous with Death (from "Poems by Alan Seeger"). 

Selwin & Blount, London — John Freeman: The Stars in 
Their Courses (from "Presage of Victory and Other Poems 
of the Time"). 

SiDGWiCK & Jackson, Adelphi — Rupert Brooke: Sonnets: — 
I. Peace, III. The Dead, IV. The Dead, V. The Soldier; 
Everard Owen: Three Hills (from "Three Hills and Other 
Poems") — ^by permission of the author. 

Smith Elder & Co., London — ^W. M. Letts: Spires of Oxford 
(from "Hallow E'en") — ^by permission of the author. 

Frederick A. Stokes Co., New York — Alfred Noyes: Forward 
(from "Lord of Misrule and Other Poems") — by permis- 
sion of the author. 

W. Thacker & Co., London— W. S. Pakenham-Walsh: 
Australia (from "Chants in War"). 

The Athen^um, London — Florence Earle Coates: Place de 
la Concorde, Aug. 14, 19 14; Frederick Niven: A Carol from 
Flanders. 

The Commercial Appeal, Memphis — Sara Beaumont Ken- 
nedy: The Call to the Colors. 

[x] 



COPYRIGHT NOTICE 



The Daily Telegraph, London — ^James Bernard Fagan: The 
Hour. 

The Globe, Toronto — J. B. Dollard: The Battle-Line; Alan 
Sullivan: Prospice. 

The Literary Digest, New York — ^Ada Tyrrell: My Son. 

The Macmillan Company, New York — Paul Fort: The Song 
of the English (from "Six French Poets"), translated by 
Amy Lowell; Wilfrid Wilson Gibson: The Father, Mad, 
Raining (from "Battle and Other Poems"); Hon. JuUan 
Grenfell: Into Battle, April, 191 5; Thomas Hardy: Song 
of the Soldiers [Men Who March Away] (from "Selected 
Poems of Thomas Hardy"); Percy Mackaye: Doubt, 
Destiny, Rheims (from "Poems and Plays"), Christmas, 
191 5 (from "Collected Poems") — by permission of the 
author; Edgar Lee Masters: O Glorious France! (from 
"Songs and Satires"); Alice Meynell: Summer in England, 
1914 (from "Poems of the Great War") ; Sir Rabindranath 
Tagore: The Trumpet (from "Fruit Gathering"); Louis 
Untermeyer: The Laughers (from "Poems of the Great 
War" by Cunliffe). 

The Masses, New York — ^Louis Untermeyer: The Laughers; 
Margaret Widdemer: God and the Strong Ones. 

The Nation, London — ^W. N. Ewer: Five Souls; Marion 
Couthouy Smith: Sainte Jeanne of France, 19x5. 

The Nation, New York — ^Witter Bynner: War; Percy 
Mackaye: France. 

The National Sunday Magazine, New York — ^William 
Griffith: Litany of Nations. 

The New Republic, New York — Ridgely Torrence: A Vision 
of Spring. 

The New Witness, London — Cecil Chesterton: France; 
Katharine Tynan: High Summer. 

[ xi ] 



COPYRIGHT NOTICE 



The New York Times, New York — Thomas Hardy: In Time 
of the Breaking of Nations, Belgium's Destitute; Alfred 
Noyes: The Searchlights; Sir Rabindranath Tagore: The 
Trumpet; George Edward Woodberry: Sonnets Written 
in the Fall of 1914 (III-VII); Thomas R. Ybarra: The 
Men of the "Emden." 

The Outlook, New York — Helen Coale Crew: Sing, Ye 
Trenches! ; Hermann Hagedorn: The Pyres, The Refugees; 
Charles Alexander Richmond: Between the Lines. 

The Poetry Bookshop, London — Maurice Hewlett: A Sing- 
song of England (from "Singsongs of the War"). 

The Poetry Journal, London — John Galsworthy: England 
to Free Men. 

The Shakespeare Head Press, Stratford-on-Avon — Gerald 
H. Crow: When They Have Made an End. 

The Spectator, London — ^Laurence Binyon: The English 
Graves; Humbert: V. D. F. In Memoriam; J. Knight- 
Adkin: No Man's Land; Joseph Lee (Sergeant): German 
Prisoners; W. M. Letts: Chaplain to the Forces. 

The Times, London — ^Laurence Binyon: The Fourth of 
August; Hon. Julian Grenfell: Into Battle, April, 1915; 
Mary C. D. Hamilton: A Hymn for Aviators (set to music 
by C. Hubert Parry) ; Everard Owen: Three Hills; Gerald 
Caldwell Siordet: To the Dead; Sir Rabindranath Tagore: 
The Trumpet; R. E. Vemede: England to the Sea. 

T. Fisher Unwin, Ltd., London — Robert W. Service: On the 
Wire. 

Westminster Gazette, London — ^Anonymous: Killed in 
Action; Damon: The Placard; Paul Fort: Les Demieres 
Pensees (translated by John Bailey); W. M. Letts: The 
Spires of Oxford; Sarojini Naidu: The Gift of India; Eden 
Phillpotts: To a Mother; C. Fox Smith: War Risks. 



[xii] 



To THE One Whose Spirit Is Wisdom and Love, 
MY MOTHER 



EDITOR'S PREFACE 

DURING the past two years and a half the compiler 
of this volume has resided in Europe, America and 
Asia and has endeavored to choose the most worthy- 
expressions of sentiment concerning the war which have 
come from these three continents. In the selection of 
verse he has aimed to exclude those poems which seemed 
to be inspired by the more extreme animosities of the 
present conflict. If he has held fast to this principle, 
it was in the hope that this anthology of war verse 
which attempts to emphasize the more permanent and 
universal features of the Great War, rather than its 
transitory, particular phases, may thus contribute in 
some small measure to a renewal of the fellowship of the 
universal community of mankind. 

I wish to express my thanks to authors and publishers 
for their kind permission to republish the poems which 
appear in this collection. 

In conclusion, I wish to thank my brother, Alexander 
Royal Wheeler, for his supervision of the task of the 
actual publication of these poems. Without his aid the 
book would not have been produced, and I am happy 
to express the gratitude which I accordingly owe him. 

William Reginald Wheeler. 

Hangchow, China 
March i, 1917 

[xv] 



FOREWORD 

A CRITICAL curse rests upon the poetry of patriotism 
and war. The passion of patriotism is common to 
all right-minded men, and criticism wants the uncommon. 
Criticism requires that a poet's vision be new and 
peculiar; whereas race-consciousness and martial glory 
have been familiar themes ever since Pharaoh's chosen 
captains were drowned in the Red Sea. The poet whose 
sole aim is to rekindle these old ardors will be fortunate, 
indeed if he escape the ninety-nine ways of banality; 
and even the hundredth way, unless he is a consummate 
artist, will hardly lead him to the very peaks of Parnassus. 
But the present war is not like other wars. Our cause 
and our interests have a more than national scope. Some- 
times, indeed, we even forget that we are fighting for 
self-preservation. The fundamental national and patri- 
otic impulse is half smothered by impulses toward 
universal humanity and righteousness. As in our Civil 
War, so to-day the struggle for self-preservation is also 
a struggle for the establishment of a great idea, upon 
which rests the hope of the world; and these years of 
ruinous militancy have also been years of unique intel- 
lectual and spiritual fermentation. The poetry of this 
war is not merely war poetry, not merely patriotic poetry; 
it is the poetry of an irresistible movement of human 
thought, reinvigorated by the very crime that was designed 
to arrest it. 

[ xvii ] 



FOREWORD 



Even those poets who have written pure war poetry 
have not written precisely the kind that might have been 
expected. There has appeared no Charge of the Light 
Brigade, no Defence of Lucknow. And this is not merely 
because the best of England's martial poets is dead. Is 
it not a natural consequence of the war's vastness? No 
individual feat of arms could sufficiently absorb the 
world's attention to provide a fit theme. In spite of Mons 
and Suvla Bay, in spite of many another single instance 
of extraordinary valor, the thing that has most pro- 
foundly impressed our imagination has been the heroic 
long endurance of whole nations in the trenches. Arnold 
Winkelried has had no opportunity, in this war, to win 
liberty and immortal renown with one sweep of his arms ; 
but we know that a million of his peers are sleeping in 
unnoted graves. 

Perhaps this accounts in part for the popular success 
of such war poems as those of Wilfrid Wilson Gibson. 
They make no invidious selection; they are typical and 
representative. They suggest what ten millions of our 
allies have been enduring, to keep our civilization secure 
and to preserve righteousness as an essential feature of it. 
The homely humor of their realism reaches our under- 
standing with a vividness that nothing in King Cambyses' 
vein could attain. Our own hearts supply the unexpressed 
sentiment. 

There is another way in which poetry has reflected the 
mere vastness of the conflict. It was one of Macaulay's 
commonplaces that war works no disturbance in the life 
of a great nation; for love, pleasure, and industry go on 
at home as before, while all the strain and shock are 

[ xviii ] 



FOREWORD 



absorbed by professional fighters far away. This com- 
placency was proper enough, before Prussia had entered 
upon her project of subjugating the world; but what do 
France and England think about it now? Some of the 
most interesting poems in Mr. Wheeler's collection are 
poems of the war as it is waged at home. They remind 
us that to-day is a day of fireside heroisms, such as 
Macaulay could never have dreamed of. 

Every reader of these poems will notice the compara- 
tive rarity of the purely martial ring. The literary trend 
of our day has been away from all high heroics; and 
especially the passion of military swagger has grown 
more and more uncongenial to a generation of peace- 
lovers. The shock of war has not wholly revolutionized 
our taste. Here and there, to be sure, will be found 
something after the old school; and at least one reader 
(though himself a peace-lover) derives from some of 
these poems a profound gratification. It surely is not 
mere elemental barbarity, it is not mere jingoism, that 
rings in the appeal of England to the Sea: 

God grant to us the old Armada weather. 
The winds that rip, the heavens that stoop and 
lour — 

Not till the sea and England sink together. 

Shall they be masters! Let them boast that hour! 

But most of the representative poets of the day subdue 
their resoluteness to a less Phrygian mode. And even 
in poems that are distinctly hortatory (like the fine verses 
of Alfred Noyes, for example) the thought is not so 

[ xix ] 



FOREWORD 



intent on the glory of the smashing blow as on the 
sacrificial consecration of the spirit. 

Here we touch again the most distinctive feature of 
the poems in this collection. The enthusiasm that inspires 
them is for the most part not merely martial, not merely 
patriotic, but moral. Moreover, since Mr. Wheeler has 
been judiciously catholic and has admitted representatives 
of many schools of thought, we are confronted by an 
interesting and bewildering spectacle of moral conflict; 
for moral enthusiasm seems to inspire with equal fervor 
the apostles of reason and the apostles of unreason. 

There are pacifists here. Their horror at the cruelty 
of war, and especially at the cruelty of this war, imparts 
a holy ardor to their counsel of non-resistance. There 
is no questioning their sincerity, nor their passionate love 
of humanity. It is like the love of a mother, refusing 
the surgical aid which alone can save her child. And 
some of the poems of this order are artistically striking. 
Ridgely Torrence, in his imitation of Catullus, has com- 
posed a metrical tour de force of uncommon charm; and 
Edith Thomas, though not aiming at ordinary poetic 
beauty, achieves a moral beauty which is undeniable. 
In pacifists of this type there is nothing contemptible 
except their logic. Because we all passionately long for 
the day when the lion shall lie down with the lamb, 
therefore, when we hear the lion roar, let us hasten to 
lie down before him! 

Happily the pacifists are a minority sect; but in their 
hatred of war they enjoy no monopoly. The majority 
of Mr. Wheeler's readers will be in sympathy with the 
majority of his poets in the depth of their indignation 

[xx] 



FOREWORD 



and revolt, even while they recognize the stern summons 
of necessity. Yet in a number of poems will be found 
consoling visions of the actual benefits of war; and those 
who know the poetry of Rupert Brooke and Alan Seeger 
will know that some of these visions are true. Amid the 
havoc that has already been wrought in Europe, whereof 
we in America are likely soon enough to know the bitter- 
ness, it is well to be reminded that war is not wholly an 
Inferno. Some of its torments are rather those of 
Purgatory, wherethrough redeemed spirits find their way 
to their souls' salvation. 

Other poets, less concerned with the ephemeral than 
with the lasting, look forward to the after-regeneration 
of the world, which is to be the guerdon of our sacrifice. 
Clinton Scollard is confident of the dawning of "that 
diviner day." Alan Sullivan foresees "after all the 
anguish, God." These visions, too, are good because they 
are cheering; but there may be higher wisdom in the 
stoicism that is less cock-sure. Perhaps the deep truth 
of the matter is spoken in William S. Johnson's Prayer 
for Peace. Perhaps humanity will best fulfil its inscru- 
table mission if it takes to heart Woodberry's grave 
rebuke to the over-sanguine: 

For man doth build on an eternal scale, 
And his ideals are framed of hope deferred; 

The millennium came not; yet Christ did not fail. 
Though ever unaccomplished is his word. 

Mr. Wheeler's taste is as catholic in art as in morals. 
He has considerately admitted to his collection a few 
specimens of what is strangely called the new poetry. 

[ xxi ] 



FOREWORD 



Considerately, too, he has not admitted very many of 
them. It is unwise to ridicule compositions of this class, 
for the originals are far funnier than anything that can 
well be said about them. Besides, the new poets are 
sincere, and are moved by a worthy purpose. Even in 
such a "poem" as The Bombardment one feels that the 
author is really trying to get at something, although a 
doubt may remain as to what that something is. Of the 
new poets, indeed, as of many of the pacifists, it may be 
said that their spirit is admirable, and that only logic 
fails them. Because recent composers of music for the 
full orchestra have not all been original geniuses, 
therefore music should hereafter be composed exclusively 
for the hurdy-gurdy! 

It is interesting to find Edgar Lee Masters, one of the 
highest priests in the sanctuary, writing a blank verse 
that is almost orthodox; and the reader will discover, in 
the eloquent beauty of his apostrophe to France, more 
poetry than in all Spoon River. Has Mr. Masters, under 
stress of profound feeling, realized that the old poetry 
is after all closest to life? On the other hand, William 
R. Benet, whose own resources in rime and rhythm are 
surely ample, has here gone half-way over to the enemy. 
With his sun "clanking across the blue," and other bits 
of figurative shrillness, he seems to approach the very 
extreme of that artificiality against which the new poetry 
thinks it is protesting; and yet, even so, it is clear that his 
wit-play proceeds from a sincere inward impulse. This 
insistent striving after the clever is but his way of 
reaching toward the expression of the inexpressible. But 
most of us are old-fashioned enough to prefer the sim- 

[ xxii ] 



FOREWORD 



plicity of old-fashioned numbers, like those of Alice 
Meynell or Laurence Binyon. 

A collection like this cannot possibly be brought up 
to date. The swift movement of events, between com- 
pilation and issue, makes even some recent utterances 
seem already old. But many of the poems of England's 
early days of war are especially alive to Americans now. 
The exact scenes of 1914 described in W. M. Letts's 
verses are re-enacted on this side of the Atlantic in 191 7; 
and poems like The Vigil and The Searchlights embody 
not visual scenes but phases of spiritual experience which 
are ours now as they were England's yesterday. Other 
strains — and one in particular — we should like to echo 
here; but can we? In poems like those of Hewlett, Gals- 
worthy, and Freeman, we hear the characteristic note of 
English patriotism. For their unquenchable love of their 
country, for their conscious pride in her history, her 
unity, her very name, what have we to show? In Eng- 
land, and still more in France and Italy, national con- 
sciousness is part of the life of every child. How is it 
with us? 

If, superficially, our national consciousness has been 
less in evidence, we may count ourselves happy. What 
Byron and Shelley said of men in general is especially 
true of men as patriots: they 

Are cradled into poetry by wrong; 

They learn in suffering what they teach in song. 

Love of country, like love of kindred, flames brightest 
in time of trouble; and we, unlike France and Italy, 
unlike even England, have long lived unfamiliar with 

[ xxiii ] 



FOREWORD 



calamity. But, although prosperous years have tempted 
us recklessly to squander our spiritual resources, these 
latest days have revealed the capital fund still intact; 
and some of the American poems in this collection, 
though written before our declaration of war, are pro- 
phetic of the spirit in which that declaration would be 
supported. We are now becoming aware that America 
really is to us very much what "dulce France" has for 
nine hundred years been to the French. May the new 
consciousness remain to purify us for the victories of 
peace that must be won hereafter! 



Charlton M. Lewis. 



[ xxiv ] 



CONTENTS 



Foreword by Charlton M. Lewis 
Anonymous 

Killed in Action 
Benet, William Rose 

The Red Country . 
BiNYON, Laurence 

Strange Fruit 

The English Graves 

The Fourth of August 
BoNNARD, Dominique 

Bells of Flanders . 
Brooke, Rupert 
I, Peace 

III. The Dead 

IV. The Dead . 
V. The Soldier . 

Burnet, Dana 

The Plaint of Pan . 

Storm . 

The Forge of God . 

Christmas in the Trenches 
Bynner, Witter 

War .... 
Cammaerts, Emile 

A Voice in the Desert 

To the Great King of a Little Country 

The Blind Man and His Son 

The Belgian Flag 

Song of the Belgians 

[ XXV ] 



page 
xvii 



II 
II 

12 
13 

13 
IS 
15 
21 

24 

25 
28 
29 

31 
32 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



Chesterton, Cecil 

France ..... 

CoATES, Florence Earle 

Place de la Concorde, August 14, 19 14 

Crew, Helen Coale 

Sing, Ye Trenches! . 

Crow, Gerald H. 

When They Have Made an End 

Damon 

The Placard 

Dargan, Olive Tilford 
Beyond War . 

DOLLARD, J. B. 

The Battle-Line 

Ewer, W. N. 

Five Souls 
Fagan, James Bernard 

The Hour 

Fort, Paul 

The Song of the English . 

Les Dernieres Pensees 
Frankau, Gilbert 

The Voice of the Slaves . 

Gun-Teams 

Eyes in the Air 

The Voice of the Guns 
Freeman, John 

The Stars in Their Courses 
Galsworthy, John 

England to Free Men 

[ xxvi ] 



CONTENTS 



Gibson, Wilfrid Wilson 

The Father .... 

Mad 

Raining .... 

Grenfell, Julian 

Into Battle. Flanders, 19 15 . 
Griffin, Bartholomew F. 

The Other Army . 
Griffith, William 

Litany of Nations . 
Hagedorn, Hermann 

The Pyres .... 

The Refugees 
Hamilton, Mary C. D. 

A Hymn for Aviators 
Hardy, Thomas 

In Time of the Breaking of Nations 

Song of the Soldiers 

Belgium's Destitute 
Hewlett, Maurice 

A Singsong of England 
Humbert 

V. D. F. In Memoriam 
Johnson, William Samuel 

Prayer for Peace 
Kennedy, Sara Beaumont 

The Call to the Colors 
Knight-Adkin, J. 

No Man's Land 
Lee, Joseph 

German Prisoners . 

[ xxvii ] 



PAGE 
66 

66 
67 

67 

69 

71 

74 

77 

79 

80 
81 
83 

84 
86 

87 
89 
90 
92 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



Letts, W. M. 

The Call to Arms in Our Streets 

The Spires of Oxford 

.Chaplain to the Forces . 
Lowell, Amy 

The Bombardment 
Mackaye, Percy 

France . . . 

Sonnets: 
Doubt 
Destiny 
Rheims 

Christmas, 1915 
Margherita, Queen 

Italian Soldiers 
Masters, Edgar Lee 

O Glorious France! , 
Meynell, Alice 

Summer in England, 19 14 
MoRLEY, Christopher 

Kitchener 
Naidu, Sarojini 

The Gift of India . 
Newbolt, Henry 

The Vigil 
Niven, Frederick ' 

A Carol from Flanders . 
Noyes, Alfred 

Forward 

The Searchlights 

A Prayer in Time of War . 

[ xxviii ] 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Oppenheim, James 

191S • "7. 

Owen, Everard 

Three Hills . 122 

Pakenham-Walsh, W. S. 

Australia 123 

Peabody, Josephine Preston 

Men Have Wings at Last . . . . ■ . 124 

Harvest Moon: 1914 ..... 128 
Phillips, Stephen 

Women and War ...... 130 

Phillpotts, Eden 

To a Mother 130 

Richmond, Charles Alexander 

Between the Lines . . . . .131 

Roberts, Cecil 

Chant of Dead Warriors 132 

Watchmen of the Night 134 

Rostand, Edmond 

The Cathedral of Rheims 136 

ScoLLARD, Clinton 

In France (1914) ...... 136 

The Madonna of Tremonde . . . .137 

The Vale of Shadows . . . . .138 

Seeger, Alan 

I Have a Rendezvous with Death . . .140 
Service, Robert W. * 

On the Wire 141 

SiORDET, Gerald Caldwell 

To the Dead 14S 

Smith, C. Fox 

War Risks i47 

[ xxix ] 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



Smith, Marion Couthouy 

Sainte Jeanne of France, 19 15 
Sullivan, Alan 

Prospice ... 

Sutton, Edward Forrester 

The Drum . 

The Pipes of the North . 
Tagore, Rabindranath 

The Trumpet 
Thomas, Edith M. 

The Woman's Cry . 
Torrence, Ridgely 

A Vision of Spring (Late Winter, 191 5) 
TowNE, Charles Hanson 

To My Country .... 
Tynan, Katharine 

High Summer 

In War-Time 

A Night Piece 
Tyrrell, Ada 

My Son 
Untermeyer, Louis 

The Laughers 

The Victory of the Beet Fields 
Vernede, R. E. 

England to the Sea 
Widdemer, Margaret 

God and the Strong Ones . 

The Old Road to Paradise 
Woodberry, George Edward 

Sonnets Written in the Fall of 1914 (III-VH) 
Ybarra, Thomas R. 

The Men of the "Emden" ... 

[ XXX ] 



A BOOK OF VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



KILLED IN ACTION 

Anonymous 
(A Mother to Her SonX 

T PLEADED long, and sternly fought despair 

■*■ Through nights that seemed unending, and I strove 

By prayer to climb the way 
To dizzy Heaven. And sweetly echoing 
I heard the anthems that the angels sing; 
And thus my frail petition, faltering there 

Turned, overawed, astray. 

Jesting he sailed — I hid a stricken heart — 
Into that frenzied Hell which mocks the sun 

And God's vast tenderness! 
Soon, in the skies of April, larks shall wing 
And chant sweet orisons in vain for him — 
A warrior fallen. Mine the sterner part 

To bear my loneliness. 

Farewell! Unvanquished, deathless in my soul 
Faith whispers comfort — till my Being thrills 

And Hope quiescent stirs — 
Then Sorrow routed flees. With clearer sight 
I see him girt in shining mail — a Knight 
(Peal now exultantly, ye bells that toll) 

Whom God hath given spurs. 

[ 1 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE RED COUNTRY 

By William Rose Benet 

T N the red country 

■*■ The sky flowers 

All day. 

Strange mechanical birds 

With struts of wire and glazed wings 

Cross the impassive sky 

Which burgeons ever and again 

With ephemeral unfolding flowers, 

White and yellow and brown, 

That spread and dissolve. 

And smaller rapid droning birds go by, 

And bright metallic bees whose sting is death. 

Behind the hills, 

Behind the whispering woods whose leaves are falling 

Yellow and red to cover the red clay, 

Misshapen monsters squat with wide black maws 

Gulping smoke and belching flame. 

From the mirk reed beds of the age of coal. 

Wallowing out of their sleep in the earlier slime, 

They are resurrected and stagger forth to slay — 

The prehistoric Beasts we thought were dead. 

They are blinded with long sleep. 
But men with clever weapons 
Goad them to fresh pastures. 

C 2 ] 



THE RED COUNTRY 



Beside still waters 

They drink of blood and neigh a horrible laughter, 

And their ponderous tread shakes happy cities down, 

And the thresh of their fiail-like tails 

Makes acres smoulder and smoke 

Blackened of golden harvest. 

The Beasts are back, 

And men, in their spreading shadow. 

Inhale the odor of their nauseous breath. 

Inebriate with it they fashion other gods 

Than the gods of day-dream. 

Of iron and steel are little images 

Made of the Beasts. 

And men rush forth and fling themselves for ritual 

Before these gods, before the lumbering Beasts, — 

And some make long obeisance. 

Umber and violet flowers of the sky. 

The sun, like a blazing Mars, clanks across the blue 

And plucks you, to fashion into a nosegay 

To offer Venus, his old-time paramour. 

But now she shrinks 

And pales 

Like Cynthia, her more ascetic sister . . . 

Vulcan came to her arms in the grimy garb 

Of toil, he smelt of the forge and the racketing workshop, 

But not of blood. 

And, if she smells these flowers, they bubble ruby blood 

That trickles between her fingers. 

[ 3 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Yet is a dream flowing over the red country, 

Yet is a light growing, for all the black furrows of the red 

country ... 
The machines are foe or friend 
As the world desires. 
The Beasts shall sleep again. 
And in that sleep, when the land is twilight-still 
And men take thought among the frozen waves of the 

dead. 
The Sowers go forth once more, 
Sowers of vision, sowers of the seed 
Of peace or war. 
Shall it be peace indeed? 

Great shadowy figures moving from hill to hill 
Of tangled bodies, with rhythmic stride and cowled 

averted head. 
What do you sow with hands funereal — 
New savageries imperial. 
Unthinking pomps for arrogant, witless men? 
Or seed for the people in strong democracy? 
What do you see 
With your secret eyes, and sow for us, that we must reap 

again? 



[ 4 ] 



STRANGE FRUIT 



STRANGE FRUIT 

By Laurence Binyon 

T I ^HIS year the grain is heavy-ripe; 
-*• The apple shows a ruddier stripe; 
Never berries so profuse 
Blackened with so sweet a juice 
Oh brambly hedges, summer-dyed. 
The yellow leaves begin to glide; 
But Earth in careless lapful treasures 
Pledge of over-brimming measures, 
As if some rich unwonted zest 
Stirred prodigal within her breast. 
And now, while plenty's left uncared. 
The fruit unplucked, the sickle spared, 
Where men go forth to waste and spill, 
Toiling to burn, destroy, and kill, 
Lo, also side by side with these 
Beast-hungers, ravening miseries, 
The heart of man has brought to birth 
Splendours richer than his earth. 
Now in the thunder-hour of fate 
Each one is kinder to his mate; 
The surly smile; the hard forbear; 
There's help and hope for all to share; 
And sudden visions of good-will. 
Transcending all the scope of ill, 
Like a glory of rare weather 
Link us in common light together, 

[ 5 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



A clearness of the cleansing sun, 
Where none's alone and all are one; 
And touching each a priceless pain 
We find our own true hearts again. 
No more the easy masks deceive: 
We give, we dare, and we believe. 



THE ENGLISH GRAVES 

By Laurence Binyon 

rflHE rains of yesterday are flown, 
-■■ And light is on the farthest hills; 
The homeliest rough grass by the stone 
To radiance thrills; 

And the wet bank above the ditch, 

Trailing its thorny bramble, shows 

Soft apparitions, clustered rich. 
Of the pure primrose. 

The shining stillness breathes, vibrates 
From simple earth to lonely sky, 

A hinted wonder that awaits 
The heart's reply. 

O lovely life! The chaffinch sings 

High on the hazel, near and clear. 

Sharp to the heart's blood, sweetness springs 
In the morning here. 

[ 6 ] 



THE ENGLISH GRAVES 



But my heart goes with the young cloud 
That voyages the April light 

Southward, across the beaches loud 
And cliffs of white 

To fields of France, far fields that spread 
Beyond the tumbling of the waves, 

And touches as with shadowy tread 
The English graves. 

There too is Earth that never weeps. 

The unrepining Earth, that holds 

The secret of a thousand sleeps 
And there unfolds 

Flowers of sweet ignorance on the slope 

Where strong arms dropped and blood 
choked breath, 

Earth that forgets all things but hope 
And smiles on death. 

They poured their spirits out in pride. 

They throbbed away the price of years: 

Now that dear ground is glorified 
With dreams, with tears. 

A flower there is sown, to bud 

And bloom beyond our loss and smart. 
Noble France, at its root is blood 

From England's heart. 



[7] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE FOURTH OF AUGUST 

By Laurence Binyon 

"VrOW in thy splendor go before us, 

•^^ Spirit of England, ardent-eyed! 

Enkindle this dear earth that bore us, 

In the hour of peril purified. 

The cares we hugged drop out of vision; 

Our hearts with deeper thoughts dilate. 
We step from days of sour division 

Into the grandeur of our fate. 

For us the glorious dead have striven. 
They battled that we might be free. 

We to their living cause are given; 
We arm for men that are to be. 

Among the nations nobliest chartered, 
England recalls her heritage. 

In her is that which is not bartered. 

Which force can neither quell nor cage. 

For her immortal stars are burning, 

With her the hope that's never done. 

The seed that's in the Spring's returning. 
The very flower that seeks the sun. 

[ 8 ] 



BELLS OF FLANDERS 



She fights the fraud that feeds desire on 
Lies, in a lust to enslave or kill, 

The barren creed of blood and iron, 

Vampire of Europe's wasted will. . . . 

Endure, O Earth! and thou, awaken. 

Purged by this dreadful winnowing-fan, 

O wronged, untameable, unshaken 
Soul of divinely suffering man! 



BELLS OF FLANDERS 

By Dominique Bonnard 
(October, 1914) 

(Translated by Lord Curzon of Kedleston) 

SUNDAY it is in Flanders, 
And, blue as flax, the sky 
O'er plain and windmill stretches 

Its peaceful canopy. 
The bells, high in the belfries. 

Are singing, blithe and gay. 
The overflowing gladness 
Of coming Holiday. 

Ring out! Ring on! Ring loudly 
The merry Flemish peal! 

But suddenly there rises 

To heaven a cry of fear — 
Quick! To the belfry, quickly! 

The ravenous horde is here, 

[9 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



See them! the crows and vultures, 

Sowers of dire alarms; 
Oh! bells, from out your steeples 
Fling forth your call to arms ! 

Ring out! Ring on! Ring madly 
The valiant Flemish peal! 

The fell sword of the troopers — 

Brief triumph shall they know — 
Upon your soil ancestral 

E'en now your sons lays low! 
But to the ruthless victor 

Your freedom dear you sell, 
Proud, dauntless little nation, 

Whom only numbers quell! 

Ring out! Ring on! Ring sadly 
The noble Flemish peal! 

But see ! in the dark heavens 

The dawn of justice light! 
There to the dim horizon 

The brutal horde takes flight. 
The radiant day of glory 

Day of revenge is here. 
Oh! bells, proclaim your triumph 

With music loud and clear! 

Ring out! Ring on! Ring proudly 
The free-born Flemish peal. 



[ 10 ] 



I. PEACE 

I. PEACE 

By Rupert Brooke 

^TOW, God be thanked Who has matched us with His 
^ hour, 

And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping, 
With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpened power, 

To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping, 
Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary. 

Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move, 
And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary. 
And all the little emptiness of love! 

Oh! we, who have known shame, we have found release 
there. 
Where there's no ill, no grief, but sleep has mending. 
Naught broken save this body, lost but breath; 
Nothing to shake the laughing heart's long peace there 
But only agony, and that has ending; 

And the worst friend and enemy is but Death. 



III. THE DEAD 

By Rupert Brooke 

BLOW out, you bugles, over the rich Dead! 
There's none of these so lonely and poor of old. 
But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold. 
These laid the world away; poured out the red 

[ 11 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be 
Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene, 
That men call age; and those who would have been, 

Their sons, they gave, their immortality. 

Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our dearth, 
Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain. 

Honor has come back, as a king, to earth, 
And paid his subjects with a royal wage; 

And Nobleness walks in our ways again; 
And we have come into our heritage. 

IV. THE DEAD 

By Rupert Brooke 

rpi HESE hearts were woven of human joys and cares, 
-■■ Washed marvellously with sorrow, swift to mirth. 
The years had given them kindness. Dawn was theirs, 

And sunset, and the colors of the earth. 
These had seen movement, and heard music; known " 

Slumber and waking; loved; gone proudly friended; 
Felt the quick stir of wonder; sat alone; 

Touched flowers and furs and cheeks. All this is 
ended. 

There are waters blown by changing winds to laughter 
And lit by the rich skies, all day. And after. 

Frost, with a gesture, stays the waves that dance 
And wandering loveliness. He leaves a white 

Unbroken glory, a gathered radiance, 
A width, a shining peace, under the night. 

[ 12 ] 



THE PLAINT OF PAN 



V. THE SOLDIER 

By Rupert Brooke 

IF I should die, think only this of me: 
That there's some corner of a foreign field 
That is for ever England. There shall be 

In that rich earth a richer dust concealed; 
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware, 

Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam, 
A body of England's, breathing English air. 

Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home. 

And think, this heart, all evil shed away, 
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less 

Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England 
given; 
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day; 
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness, 
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven. 



THE PLAINT OF PAN 

By Dana Burnet 

MARS has my reed! My pipe of water rush. 
Whereon I played the shepherds to their toil, 
And whistled up the reaper in the dawn. 

And whiled the plowman furrowing the soil. 

[ 13 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



My reed! My precious pipe! The trill in it 

Was lighter than the laugh of water-brooks — 

'Twas life itself, I tell you — oft and oft 

I've charmed a savant with it from his books, 

And made a wise man of him, too! And then 

When twilight hazed the pretty woodland streams, 
I've led my lovers with a lilt of faith 
■' Until their eyes were wonderful with dreams. 

I've piped the winding caravans of peace, 

And set a singing wind to blow the ships — 

Now Mars, the braggart, thieves my pipe away. 
And claps it to his rough and blowsy lips. 

Jupiter, listen! Does he know the stops? 

Can he awake those silver twining airs 
By which I bound my world? Hark, as he pipes 

Afar the angry strident trumpet blares! 

My song is twisted out of all its sweet! 

Souls cry in agony! The loosed sword gleams; 
Oh, Jupiter, give Pan his pipes again! 

The world's awry — and there are no more dreams! 



[ 14 ] 



THE FORGE OF GOD 



STORM 

By Dana Burnet 

OUT of the thunder leaps a crooked sword 
Bright as a serpent's tongue — aye, bright as blood, 
And men within the moment cast their cloths 
And stand forth naked in a snarling brood. 

The storm treads on like some great-booted god, 
Roaring and slaying with its bloody fists, 

And men are milled between its awful palms — 

Their vaunted masteries are blown like mists. . . . 

We have not conquered elemental things. 

Not chained the lightnings, nor controlled the skies — 
The storm breaks and the world's a beast again. 

Snarling, at bay, with terror in its eyes! 



THE FORGE OF GOD 

By Dana Burnet 
I. 

WE had dug a trench in the broken field, in the field 
just plowed for sowing, 
Behind us stood the taken town with its fired towers 

glowing, 
And high above it on the hill a scarlet flag was blowing. 

[ 15 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



We had sacked the town at dusk, 

Left it black and cold and still 

On the shoulder of the hill, 
With its beauty all a husk, 
Empty, empty in the dusk — 
And a scar upon the temple that was lifted to His name. 

But the Emperor had smiled 

Like a pleased and haughty child. 

Clapped his clean white hands and cried, 

At the splendor that had died, 
At his scarlet flag flung skyward like a sudden wisp of 
flame ! 

There was naught but red and black 

In that conquered world of ours; 
'Twas a bitter town to sack 

With its cursed priestly scars ! 

Though we said the name of Mars 
As we laid it on the rack. 

Still it turned us ghostly faces when we smote it with the 
rod; 

Turned us faces black and red; 

Looked with eyes we knew were dead, 
Till the very earth was horror where our iron feet had 
trod. ... 

Trampled soils and shaking airs. 

Smoke and screams and futile prayers. 
And the sunset like a bleeding wound upon the breast 
of God! 

[ 16 ] 



THE FORGE OF GOD 



We had ringed the town with steel, 

We had compassed it with flame, 
And our royal master came 
With his gentlemen at heel 

To the temple where the solid shot had torn their grinning 
holes. 
And below the blackened hill 
Slept the creatures of his will, 
Slept his soldiers in the trenches like a brood of weary 
moles; 
But the whimper of their breath 
Told how deep they dreamed of death 
And the faces of the things they'd killed made trouble in 
their souls. 

There was blood upon their hands. 

And they moaned again, again; 

They were not machines, but men 
Freed from fetters and commands, 
And they whimpered till the Emperor came stumbling 
from his wines — 

Came his gentlemen close after 

With their lips still set for laughter, 
Heard, and sickened at the horror of the Wind that swept 
the Lines. 

So stood shaking in the street. 

With their laughter stricken dead. 
With their chaos at their feet. 

And the temple overhead, 

C 17 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



And the monarch struck the pose he loved, the pose he 
hoped was fame. 
But the whisper on the night ; -■ 

Made his cheek a sickly white, 
And the tower made him little; stripped him naked to 
his name. 

Then a Light leaped suddenly 

From the temple's inner gloom. 

Like God's glory in a tomb 
When the sheeted soul goes free. 
From the gutted temple's dusk, 
From the wither and the husk, 

Glowed a Light of sudden splendor like a fallen brand 
of dawn. 

It was glory, it was wrath. 
It was fury of His name. 

As it beat its crimson path 

To the cross upon the spire 

Stabbing starward, higher, higher, 
Till it fluttered down and faltered like a gleaming sword 
withdrawn. 



II. 

A burning priest stood in the door. 

I swear he burned; his garments burned. 
His face was fire as he turned, 

A thing no man had seen before! 

A miracle ... a burning man! 

And some there were who cried and ran — 

[ 18 ] 



THE FORGE OF GOD 



But he came with a crucifix between his smoking fists. 
An iron crucifix, he had; 
A Cross ... an image of the Tree 
Oh which our Lord of Galilee 
Was tortured by a world gone mad — 
Came he afire from the door 

Strode down and plucked the jeweled brand, 
From the pale monarch's shaking hand, 
Held high the arms of peace and war. 
Held high the Sword; the Cross held high 
Till their great shadows marked the sky 
Flung dancing up by that same Light that played about 
his wrists. 

Then in that scarred and sacred spot. 

The great Light leaped full-wrathed again; 
He thrust the glittered sword within. 
And when the blade was glowing hot 
He beat it with the heavy Cross, 
God's iron on hell's steel. . . . The toss 
Of sparks made starry radiance about him as he toiled, 
And while we waited, shorn of breath. 
He lifted up the thing he'd made — 
A rough-wrought plowshare. . . . Then he swayed 
And fell, and lay there cold in death. 
He was a man, and he had burned. 
He lay there, stilled; his face was turned 
To the first gray of dawn that marked the temple all 
despoiled. 

[ 19 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



III. 

Up from the trench in the broken field, in the field of iron 

reaping, 
There rose a cry of frighted men, and a thousand men 

came leaping. 
Came up the hill with staring eyes and spirits shocked 

from sleeping. 

There was moan upon their lips. 
There was terror in their eyes. 
They had seen against the skies 
God . . . with smoking finger-tips, 
Smite the glowing blade of war 
Snatched from their pale Emperor! 
In the furnace of the morning they had seen a plowshare 
wrought! 
They came crying up the hill 

Where the town stood like a husk, 
In the morning's pearly dusk. 
To the temple, charred and still. 
To their posing monarch's feet. 
In the stricken wasted street. 
All their costly iron discipline made nothing by a thought. 
And they took him in their hands. 

Took the King in their rough clasp. 
Till he cried out at their grasp, 
Shouting futile wild commands. 
But they laughed ... a thousand men. 
Laughed and cried and laughed again, 

[ 20] 



CHRISTMAS IN THE TRENCHES 



Caught the King up in their hands and flung their 
weapons all away, 
And they beat their breasts and sang, 
Marching downward from the hill, 
Masters, masters of their will! 
And their wild hosannas rang 
From a thousand throats to God 
Lifting, lifting as they trod, 
And above the ruined temple, lo, the sudden breaking 
day! 



CHRISTMAS IN THE TRENCHES 

(An Incident) 
By Dana Burnet 

I. 

STILL the guns! 
There's a ragged music on the air, 

A priest has climbed the ruined temple's stair, 
Ah, still the guns! 
It's Christmas morning. Had ye all forgot? 

Peace for a little while, ye battle-scarred— 
Or do ye fear to cool those minds grown hot? 

Up the great lovely tower, wracked and marred. 
An old priest toils — 
Men of the scattered soils, 

[ 21 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Men of the British mists, 

Men of France ! 

Put by the lance. 
Men of Irish fists, 
Men of heather, 
Kneel together — 
Men of Prussia, 
Great dark men of Russia, 
Kneel, kneel! 

Hark how the slow bells peal. 
A thousand leagues the faltered music runs. 
Ah, still the wasting thunder of the guns. 
Still the guns! 

II. 

Out of the trenches lifts a half-shamed song, 

''Holy Night!" 
Here, where the sappers burrowed all night long 

To bring the trench up for the morrow's fight, 

A British lad, with face unwonted white. 
Looks at the sky and sings a carol through, 

"God rest you, merry gentlemen!" 
It was the only Christmas thing he knew. 

And there were tears wrung out of hard-lipped men, 
Tears in the strangest places. 
Tears on troopers' faces! 

III. 

They had forgotten what a life was for, 
They had been long at suffering and war, 

[ 22 ] 



CHRISTMAS IN THE TRENCHES 



They had forgot old visions, one by one, 

But now they heard the tolling bell of Rheims, 

Tolling bell of Rheims; 
They saw the bent priest, white-haired in the sun, 
Climb to the hazard of the weakened spire, 
They saw, and in them stirred their hearts' desire 
For Streets and Cities, Shops and Homes and Farms, 

They only wanted space to love and live; 
They felt warm arms about them — women's arms, 

And such caresses as a child might give 
Coming all rosy in the early day 

To kiss his world awake . . . 

The British lad 
Broke off his carol with a sob. The play 

Of churchly musics, solemn, strange, and sad, 
Fluttered in silver tatters down the wind. 
Flung from the tower where the guns had sinned 
Across the black and wounded fields. . . . The bell 

Sang on — a feeble protest to the skies, 
Until the world stood like a halted hell, 

And men with their dead brothers at their feet 
Drew dirty sleeves across their tired eyes. 
Finding the cracked chimes overwhelming sweet. 

IV. 

Aye, still the guns ! 

And heed the Christmas bell, 

Ye who have done Death's work so well, 

Ye worn embattled ones, 

[ 23 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Kneel, kneel! 

Put by the blood-stained steel, 

Men from the far soils and the scattered seas, 

Go down upon your knees, 

While there is one with faith enough to dare 

The wracked cathedral's crumbled broken stair — 

While there lives one with peace upon his eyes. 

While hope's faint song is fluttered to the skies. 

In that brief space between the Christmas suns, 

Still the guns! 

"The Plaint of Pan," "Storm," "The Forge of God," and "Christmas 
in the Trenches" are from POEMS, by Dana Burnet. Copyright, 1915, 
by Harper and Brothers. Reprinted by special permission. 



WAR 

By Witter Bynner 

FOOLS, fools, fools, 
Your blood is hot to-day. 

It cools 
When you are clay. 
It joins the very clod 
Wherein you look at God, 
Wherein at last you see 

The living God, 

The loving God, 
Which was your enemy. 



[ 24 ] 



A VOICE IN THE DESERT 



A VOICE IN THE DESERT 

By Emile Cammaerts 
(Translated by Tita Brand-Cammaerts) 

A HUNDRED yards from the trenches, 
-^^- Close to the battle front, 
There stands a little house 
Lonely and desolate. 

Not a man, not a bird, not a dog, not a cat. 
Only a flight of crows along the railway line, 
The sound of our boots on the muddy road 
And, along the Yser, the twinkling fires. 

A low thatched cottage 
With doors and shutters closed, 
The roof torn by a shell, 
Standing out of the floods alone. 

Not a cry, not a sound, not a life, not a mouse, 
Only the stillness of the great graveyards, 
Only the crosses — the crooked wooden crosses — 
On the wide lonely plain. 

A cottage showing grey 

Against a cold black sky, 

Blind and deaf in the breeze 

Of the dying day, 

And the sound of our footsteps slipping 

On the stones as we go by. . . . 

[ 25 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Suddenly, on the silent air, 
Warm and clear, pure and sweet 
As sunshine upon golden moss. 
Strong and tender as a prayer, 
Through the roof a girl's voice rang 
And the cottage sang! 

"When the sap begins to spring — 
Red willows, catkins grey — 
When the sap begins to spring 
The cock will greet the day. 

"The cow will sound her horn — 
Gold straw and sunny shed — 
So loud she'll low that morn 
That she will wake the dead. 

"Our hammers then will clash — 
Strong arms and naked breast — 
Saws whirr and forges flash 
And sparkle without rest. 

"Each church will ope its door — 
Perveyse, Ypres and Kieuport — 
And with strong clanging bell 
Thunder the Germans' knell. 

"Then will our trowels ring — 
Dixmude and Ramscapelle — 
And shouts and laughter swell 
And busy pickaxe swing. 

[ 26 ] 



A VOICE IN THE DESERT 



"Our boats will glide along — 
Black tar and sea-gulls white — 
We'll hear the skylarks' song 
Above our rivers bright. 

"And then our graves will bloom — 
Dance, tomtits, on the sod — 
And then our graves will bloom 
Beneath the sun of God." 

Not a breath, not a sound, not a soul. 

Only the crosses, the crooked wooden crosses . , 

"Come, 'tis getting late. 

'Tis but a peasant girl 

With her father, living there. 

They will not go away. 

Nothing will make them yield. 

They will die, they say, 

Sooner than leave their field . . ." 

Not a breath, not a life, not a soul. 
Only a flight of crows along the railway line, 
The sound of our boots on the muddy road, 
And, along the Yser, the twinkling fires. 



[ 27 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



TO THE GREAT KING OF A LITTLE 
COUNTRY 

By Emile Cammaerts 
(Translated by Tita Brand-Cammaerts) 

WHERE you lead us we will follow, 
Through the rain and through the snow, 
Through the valley, o'er the hill, 
And we'll give our life to you 
When you will. 

What you do. Sire, we will do. 
And where you go, we will go, 
We'll follow you throughout the years. 
Even through fire and through tears. 
Through the awful war sound droning 
And the maddening crash of battle, 
Where the wounded make their moaning 
And the whistling shrapnel rattle . . . 
Where you lead us we will follow, 
And we'll give our life to you 
When you will. 

We'll go to Antwerp, Ghent, Termonde, 
Louvain and Aerschot take again. 
We'll purge the land of hated powers 
Which crush us now in vain. 
We'll give you back Brussels and Liege, 

[ 28 ] 



THE BLIND MAN AND HIS SON 



Recross the Meuse there at Vise, 
Together we shall see the towers 
Of Aix rise 'neath a purer sky, 
And we shall hear, one longed-for day, 
Sound of cymbals loud begin 
Triumphantly, as you pass by 
Under the Lime Trees in Berlin! . . . 

May God guard you as you guard us. 
Protect you, Sire, as you protect us. 
King of but a hundred fields 
And of twenty village spires. 
King of Fumes, our soldier King! 
King of honour — honesty — 
Pride of whom our land must sing, 
Champion of humanity! 
Where you lead us we will follow. 
And we'll give our life to you 
When you will. 



THE BLIND MAN AND HIS SON 

By Emile Cammaerts 
(Translated by Alfred Perceval Graves) 

* ' T HEAR no more the distant roar 
•*■ Of the enemy's gun; 
Where are we, O my son?" 
"My father, safe on England's shore!" 

[ 29 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"I hear no more the frantic wind 

Amid the cordage moan; 
Again my fumbling footsteps find 

Firm sand with pebbles strown. 
My son, are all our miseries o'er?" 
"Father, we stand on England's shore." 

"Kind words I cannot understand 

Are falling on my ear; 
Far, far am I from my own land. 

Why is their sound so dear?" 
"O father, it is England's speech 
That welcomes us upon the beach." 

"My son, a fragrance sweet yet sharp 

As liberty's own breath 
My soul inhales; it stirs my harp 

And wakens it from death. 

"Bird, tree, and brook with sweet turmoil 
Of home so much they mind me. 

Why should they loose my sorrow's coil. 
Why such refreshment find me?" 

"Father, you rest on English soil." 

"Bow down, my son, bow down with me. 

And, knee to knee. 
Let each first lay his war-bruised hand 
On this good earth, his warm lips press 
Against it, praying next to his own land 
That God this fair, free English soil may bless." 

[ 30 ] 



THE BELGIAN FLAG 



THE BELGIAN FLAG 

By Emele Cammaerts 
(Translated by Lord Curzon of Kedleston) 

RED for the blood of soldiers, 
Black, yellow and red — 
Black for the tears of mothers. 

Black, yellow and red — 
And yellow for the light and flame 

Of the fields where the blood is shed! 

To the glorious flag, my children. 

Hark! the call your country gives, 

To the flag in serried order! 

He who dies for Belgium lives! 

Red for the purple of heroes, 

Black, yellow and red — 
Black for the veils of widows. 

Black, yellow and red — 
And yellow for the shining crown 

Of the victors who have bled ! 

To the flag, the flag, my children. 
Hearken to your country's cry! 

Never has it shone so splendid. 
Never has it flown so high! 

[ 31 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Red for the flames in fury, 

Black, yellow and red — 
Black for the mourning ashes, 

Black, yellow and red — 
And yellow of gold, as we proudly hail 

The spirits of the dead! 

To the flag, my sons ! Your country 
With her blessing "Forward" cries! 

Has it shrunken? No, when smallest. 
Larger, statelier, it flies! 

Is it tattered? No, 'tis stoutest 
When destruction it defies! 



SONG OF THE BELGIANS 

By Emile Cammaerts 
(Translated by Lord Curzon of Kedleston) 

T3 ECK not that your wounds are bleeding, 
^ ^ Reck not that your voice is weak: 
Louder than the roar of cannon. 

Higher than the battle-shriek, 
Sing, my countrymen, the story 

Of the fields we have not won, 
Fields of failure but of glory, 

'Neath this fair autumnal sun: 
Sing how, when the tempter whispered, 

"Buy your safety with your shame," 
Said we, "Sooner no dishonor 

Shall defile the Belgian name!" 

[ 32 ] 



SONG OF THE BELGIANS 



Here, amid the smoking ruins, 

Dinant, Aerschot, Termonde, 
Beat the drum and blow the bugle, 

Dance to the unwonted sound ! 
Belgians, dance and sing our glory 

On this consecrated ground — 
Eyes are burning, brains are turning — 

Heed not! dance the merry round! 

Come with flaming beechen branches. 

And the music of the drum; 
Come, and strew them on the earth-heaps 

Where our dead lie buried, come! 
Choose a day like this, my brothers, 

When the wind a pattern weaves 
'Mid the shivering poplar tree-tops. 

When the scent of fallen leaves 
Floats like perfume through the woodland, 

As it doth to-day, that so 
Some sweet odor of our good land 

May be with them, down below. 

We will pray the earth they held so 

Dear, to rock them in her arm. 
On her vast and ample bosom 

Once again to make them warm, 
So that haply, as they slumber, 

They may dream of battles new, 
Dream that Brussels is retaken. 

That Malines is theirs anew, 

[ 33 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



That Namur, Liege, and Louvain 
See their armies enter in, 

Till they thunder, in the under- 
World, into a waste Berlin! 

Reck not that your wounds are bleeding, 

Reck not that your voice is weak: 
Deeper than the roar of cannon. 

Higher than the battle-shriek, 
E'en altho your wounds are bleeding, 

E'en altho your heart-strings break, 
Sing of hope and hate unshaken, 

'Neath this fair autumnal sun: 
Sing how, when the tempter whispered, 

"Sweet is vengeance, when 'tis done," 
Said we louder, "We are prouder, 

Mercy's garland to have won!" 



FRANCE 

By Cecil Chesterton 

"D ECAUSE for once the sword broke in her hand, 
^-^ The words she spoke seemed perished for a space; 
All wrong was brazen, and in every land 

The tyrants walked abroad with naked face. 

The waters turned to blood, as rose the Star 

Of evil fate denying all release. 
The rulers smote the feeble crying "War!" 

The usurers robbed the naked crying "Peace!" 

[ 34 ] 



PLACE DE LA CONCORDE 



And her own feet were caught in nets of gold, 

And her own soul profaned by sects that squirm, 

And little men climbed her high seats and sold 
Her honor to the vulture and the worm. 

And she seemed broken and they thought her dead, 
The Over-Men, so brave against the weak. 

Has your last word of sophistry been said, 

O cult of slaves? Then it is hers to speak. 

Clear the slow mists from her half-darkened eyes, 
As slow mists parted over Valmy fell, 

And once again her hands in high surprise 
Take hold upon the battlements of Hell. 



PLACE DE LA CONCORDE 

August 14, 1914 
By Florence Earle Coates 

[Since the bombardment of Strasbourg, August 14, 1870, her statue in 
Paris, representing Alsace, has been draped in mourning by the French 
people.] 

AT EAR where the royal victims fell 

-^ ^ In days gone by, caught in the swell 

Of a ruthless tide 

Of human passion, deep and wide: 

There where we two 

A Nation's later sorrow knew — 

[ 35 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



To-day, O friend! I stood 

Amid a self-ruled multitude 

That by nor sound nor word 

Betrayed how mightily its heart was stirred. 

A memory Time never could efface — 

A memory of grief — 

Like a great Silence brooded o'er the place; 

And men breathed hard, as seeking for relief 

From an emotion strong 

That would not cry, tho held in check too long. 

One felt that joy drew near — 

A joy intense that seemed itself to fear — 

Brightening in eyes that had been dull, 

As all with feeling gazed 

Upon the Strasbourg figure, raised 

Above us — mourning, beautiful! 

Then one stood at the statue's base, and spoke- 
Men needed not to ask what word; 
Each in his breast the message heard, 
Writ for him by Despair, 
That evermore in moving phrase 
Breathes from the Invalides and Pere Lachaise — 
Vainly it seemed, alas! 
But now, France looking on the image there, 
Hope gave her back the lost Alsace. 

A deeper hush fell on the crowd: 

A sound — the lightest — seemed too loud 

[ 36 ] 



SING, YE TRENCHES! 



(Would, friend, you had been there!) 

As to that form the speaker rose, 

Took from her, fold on fold, 

The mournful crape, gray- worn and old, 

Her, proudly, to disclose. 

And with the touch of tender care 

That fond emotion speaks, 

'Mid tears that none could quite command, 

Placed the Tricolor in her hand. 

And kissed her on both cheeks! 

SING, YE TRENCHES! 

By Helen Coale Crew 

OING, ye trenches bloody-lipped! 

^ Sing! For into you has slipped 

Lycidas, dead ere his prime. 

All ye cruel trenches, sing! 

Under frost and under rime 

All his body beautiful, 

All his body wonderful. 

Low hath lain. Now, cunningly, 

April, with sweet mystery, 

Molds the trenches horror-lipped 

Into chalices of spring. 

Who would not sing for Lycidas? 
See, across the hideous gashes 
Soft green fire of April flashes, 
Starred with windfiowers delicate; 
Gemmed with purple violet; 

[ 37 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Roseate with crimson glow 
Where again his pulses blow 
In young clover. For his sake 
See the budding crocus break 
Into flame; and hear the grass, 
Green-tongued, sing for Lycidas! 

Sing, ye gaping wounds of earth! 
Tomb-like, ye have taken him, 
Cradled him, distilled him; 
Womb-like, ye have brought to birth 
Myriad flowers and fragrances. 
Requiemed with spring he lies. 
God, who took unto his heart 
All his throbbing, vital part. 
Sowed his body in the earth. 
Let the trumpets of the grass 
Paean shout for Lycidas! 



WHEN THEY HAVE MADE AN END 

By Gerald H. Crow 

When they have made an end 
Of their importunate crying over you 

"God speed," and "God defend," 
And time is swift and there is nought to do 
But match with wilder hope our wild despair; 

When there is quiet, bend 
Your lips to mine, and in the darkness there 

Wish me good courage, friend. 

[ 38 ] 



THE PLACARD 



THE PLACARD 

By Damon 

*'Tj^NEMY'S Terrible Losses"— in letters of red on 
■*-^ white 

The placard flared its message out through the mist and 
rain: 

Enemy's terrible losses — I saw the figures plain, 

But their greatness had no meaning, no picture to serve 
my sight. 

I was but glad when I read them, clear in the dim war- 
light, 

Thinking: the sooner ended the more we have maimed 
and slain; . . . 

But later when sleep forsook me the placard flashed again, 

Burning my inward vision in the lonely deep of night. 

The thousands stood no longer in printed figures of red — 
They were heaped in desolate places, who heard their 

country's call. 
And went out singing to battle, and now — lay quiet all. 
And afar in steep-roofed cities, the homes of the enemy 

dead, 
Went up the prayers of women who knew not yet of their 

fall. 
And voices of other women who wept uncomforted. 



[39] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



BEYOND WAR 

By Olive Tilford Dargan 



XTOW seres the planet like a leaf 
-^^ On burnt and shaken Ygdrasil. 

What voice have we for this wide ill? 
How shall we mourn when God in grief 

Bows for a world he made and lost 
At love's eternal cost? 

'Tis not that brides shall turn to stone, 
And mothers bend with bitter cry 
Cursing the day they did not die 

When daring death they bore a son, 

And waifs shall lift their thin hands up 
For famine's empty cup; 

'Tis not that piled in bleeding mounds 
These fathers, sons, and brothers moan, 
Or torn upon the seas go down 

Glad that the waves may hide their wounds; 
Not that the lips that knew our kiss 
Are parched and black, but this: 

That thou must pause, O vaulting Mind, 
Untrammelled leaper in the sun; 
Pause, stricken by the spear of one. 

The savage thou hadst left behind; 
Fall, gibber, fade, and final pass, 
Less than returning grass: 

[ 40] 



BEYOND WAR 



That Hate shall end what Love began, 
And strip from Life her human boast,- 
The Maker's whitest dream be lost, 

The dream he trusted to the Man, 

The Man who upright rose and stared 
Farther than eagle dared: 

That now the red lust blinds the eye 
That bore the vision, held the star; 
And where Life's fossil recreants are 

Another bone and skull shall lie. 

While she to dust must stoop again 
To build her more than men. 



II. 

But as the blackest marble's lit 

With struggle of a birthless dawn, — 
Nay, as behind her door undrawn 

Hell forges key that opens it. 

And souls that troop to light and breath 
Cast habit then of death; 

Our dark, this dark, wears still a gleam. 
O God, thou wilt not turn thine eyes 
For comfort to thine other skies, — 

Some other star that saved thy dream, — 
Until, her gory fiends fordone, 
Night wrestles to the sun! 

[ 41 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Canst find no cheer in this, that o'er 
Our moaning, reeking battle dews, 
And redder than the blood we lose. 

More hot and swift, in surge before 

War's shriek and smoke, goes up as flame 
The scarlet of our shame? 

Stripped and unchristianed in a day, 
Made naked by one blast of war, 
Bare as the beast we know we are, 

Not less shame marks the man, and they 
Who wear with blush the fang and claw 
May yet make love their law. 

For "honor" lift we dripping hands. 

For "home" we loose the storm of steel 
Till over earth Thy homeless reel. 

For "country!" — Thine are all the lands. 
We pray, but thou hast seen our dead 
Who knew not why they bled. 

So warm were they, with destinies 
Like straining stars that lustrously 
Bore Goethes, Newtons not to be. 

("Long live the king! ") So warm were these 
That dropped, and the cold moon alone 
May count them, stone by stone. 

[ 42 ] 



BEYOND WAR 



Ah, Courage, what slain dreams of men 
Thy blind, brave eyes here shut upon ! 
Let reckoners to come outrun 

This unstanched loss. Dumb until then. 
We wet Eternity with tears; 
The aching score is hers. 



III. 



O Brothers of the lyre and reed, 
Lend not a note to this wild fray. 
Where Christ still cries in agony 

"They know not, Father, thou dost bleed!" 
Cast here no song, like flower prest 
To Slaughter's seething breast. 

But be the minstrel breath of Peace; 
For her alone lift up your lyre, 
Mad with the old celestial fire. 

Or on our earth let music cease, 

While keep we day and night the long 
Dumb funeral of song. 

And if among ye one should rise. 
Blind garlander of armored crime. 
Trailing the jungle in a rhyme. 

Let him be set 'neath blackened skies 
By mourning doors, and there begin 
The last chant of our sin. 

[ 43 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Long gone the warrior's dancing plume 
That played o'er battle's early day; 
Now must his song be laid away. 

Child-relic, that was glory's bloom; 
And Man who cannot sing his scars, 
Is he not done with wars ? 

Ay, hearts deny the feet of haste, 

And as they muster, oh, they break! 
Hate's loudest fife no more can wake 

In them the lust to kill and waste. 
And madly perish, fool on fool. 

That Might, the brute, may rule. 

We hope! Love walks thee yet, O Earth! 
Through thy untunable days she glows 
A bowed but yet untrampled rose. 

Wearing the fearless flush of birth, — 
Yea, in our songless shame doth see 
Thyself her harp to be! 

Ye ages turning men to mould. 

Yours be the past, the future ours! 
God hear us! There are infant powers 

Stronger than giant sins of old! 

To all the hells that are and were 
Man rises challenger. 

C 44 ] 



THE BATTLE-LINE 



Tho' now at final Autumn seem 

Our world with blood and ashes wound, 
Unfaltering Spring shall choose her ground; 

Man shall rebuild with bolder dream, 
The god astir in every limb, 
And earth be green for him; 

And Peace shall cast afar her seed, 

Shall set the fields where skulls have lain 
With altar herb for every pain. 

With myrtle and with tuned reed, 

Till stars that watch have sign to sing 
A sister's flowering. 



THE BATTLE-LINE 

By J. B. DOLLARD 

A THWART that land of bloss'ming vine 
-^~*- Stretches the awful battle-line; 
A lark hangs singing in the sky. 
With sullen shrapnel bursting nigh! 
Along the poplar-bordered road 
The peasant trudges with his load, 
While horsemen and artillery 
Rush to red fields that are to be ! 
The plains for tillage furrowed well 
Are now replowed with shot and shell! 
The ditches, swollen by the rain. 
Show bloated faces of the slain. 

[45 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



The hedge-rows sweet with leaf and flower 
Now mask the cannon's murderous power! 
Small birds by household cares opprest 
Beg truce and time to build their nest. 
The sun sinks down — oh, blest release! 
And the spent world cries out for peace, 
In vain! In vain! Tho' mild stars shine, 
War wakes the thundering battle-line. 



FIVE SOULS 

By W. N. Ewer 

First Soul — 

I was a peasant of the Polish plain; 

I left my plow because the message ran : 

Russia, in danger, needed every man 

To save her from the Teuton; and was slain. 

/ gave my life for freedom — this I know; 

For those who bade me fight had told me so. 

Second Soul — 

I was a Tyrolese, a mountaineer ; 
I gladly left my mountain home to fight 
Against the brutal, treacherous Muscovite; 
And died in Poland on a Cossack spear. 
/ gave my life for freedom — this I know; 
For those who bade me fight had told me so. 

[ 46 ] 



FIVE SOULS 



Third Soul — 

I worked in Lyons at my weaver's loom, 

When suddenly the Prussian despot hurled 
His felon blow at France and at the world; 

Then I went forth to Belgium and my doom. 
/ gave my life for freedom — this I know; 
For those who bade me fight had told me so. 

» 

Fourth Soul — 

I owned a vineyard by the wooded Main, 
Until the Fatherland, begirt by foes 
Lusting her downfall, called me, and I rose 

Swift to the call — and died in fair Lorraine. 
/ gave my life for freedom — this I know; 
For those who bade me fight had told me so. 

Fifth Soul — 

I worked in a great shipyard by the Clyde, 

There came a sudden word of wars declared, 
Of Belgium, peaceful, helpless, unprepared, 

Asking our aid; I joined the ranks, and died. 
/ gave my life for freedom — this I know; 
For those who bade me fight had told me so. 



[47 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE HOUR 

By James Bernard Fagan 

WE'VE shut the gates by Dover Straits, 
And North, where the tides run free, 
Cheek by jowl, our watchdogs prowl. 
Grey hulks in a greyer sea. 
And the prayer that England prays to-night — 
O Lord of our destiny! — 
As the foam of our plunging prows, is white; 
We have stood for peace, and we war for right, 
God give us victory! 

Now slack, now strung, from the mainmast flung. 

The flag throbs fast in the breeze ; 

Strained o'er the foam, like the hearts at home 

That beat for their sons on the seas. 

For mothers and wives are praying to-night — 

O Lord of our destiny! — 

But we've no time, for our lips are tight^ 

Our fists are clenched, and we're stripped to fight. 

God give us victory! 

The west winds blow in the face of the foe — 

Old Drake is beating his drum — 

They drank to "The Day," for "The Hour" we pray. 

The day and the hour have come. 

The sea-strewn Empire prays to-night — 

O Lord of our destiny!— 

Thou didst give the seas into Britain's might. 

For the freedom of Thy seas we smite. 

God give us victory! 

[ 48 ] 



THE SONG OF THE ENGLISH 



THE SONG OF THE ENGLISH 

By Paul Fort 
(Translated by Amy Lowell) 

It's a long way to Tipperary 

"C^IRE! Tommy . . . My heart capers to the banging 
■*■ of our cannon. Be calm, old fellow. Ah! it is a 
long way, a long way to Tipperary. Since yesterday's 
thirst quenched without a drop of whiskey, I shoot, every 
one shoots. Ah! ... it's fine. 

Who threw me his bottle? Ah, old Bob, you're dead? 
Be calm, dear boy. Soon Leicester . . . Square . . . 
All right! He died for old England. The bottle is empty. 
Fire! Tommy, shoot some more! We are all fighting 
very well, all right, the dead are wrong. 

Quiet, old boy. Ah, it is a long way, a long way to 
Tipperary, over there, near the pretty girl I know. She 
said yes when I said no. Fire, Tommy. My heart 
capers to the banging of our cannon. 

Tommy, understand. Tommy, love has points. Yes, 
it's a delicate, distant lady that one never reaches except 
in dreams. O big mug! You dream and everything 
comes; the soul and the body with it. Here there is 
nothing but death, she is an infernal woman. 

[49 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Death! Ah! if I had looked her way, the German 
would have taken my neck under her withered arm, and 
made me taste her mouth with shrapnel for teeth, suffo- 
cating my chest to torture. Good God, love hasn't any- 
thing crueller than that. 

But death, one doesn't think about it, it is in front. 
Calm, lucky chap. Do you want to see death? She is 
a great, old, worn-out skeleton, floating over the battle 
like a standard: just now she is floating over the pointed 
helmets. 

Fire! Tommy . . . What, you are dying too, faithful 
fellow? You are in the arms of the infernal woman? 
Get up, old man! Ah, it is a long way, a long way to 
Tipperary. Goodbye, Leicester Square. Goodbye, 
Piccadilly! 

We were fifteen, hurrah, there are three of us moving. 
O cannon, your balls are tinged with our blood, our blood 
which makes our uniforms red again: in front of us the 
Germans are bleeding fear, they believe that we load your 
jaws with our hearts. 

Dance, dance the jig! Ah, yes . . . though victors 
we dance our jig in God's open sky. We, good boys, we 
are at Tipperary. Hullo, Kate; hullo, Annie; hullo, 
Nellie . . . Our hearts are comfortable, provided that, 
on earth, 

our old England lives forever! 

[ 50 ] 



LES DERNIERES PENSEES 



LES DERNIERES PENSEES 

By Paul Fort 
(English Version by John Bailey) 

rr^HE twilight falls, spring's softest airs wave round my 
-*- head again. 

What strange thing comes with them to-night? The 
dreams of dying men. 

Hark! By the open window there, what means that 

rustling leaf? 
A dying soldier's dying thoughts, his love, and joy, and 

grief. 

Yon bell, whose sounds across the fields die slowly one 

by one, 
A dying soldier's ears still hear its solemn-booming tone. 

Another's last thoughts travel back to scenes of childish 

play, 
To boys who roved the fields with him through many a 

summer day. 

So near their dreams are. This sweet hour is drenched 

with memory. 
'Tis all we ask. We would not stay our sons who fight 

and die. 

[ 51 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



My dying boy, whose dying eyes pass from some darkened 
room 

To where in the old farmstead still lambs bleat and fruit- 
trees bloom, 

You will not be the last, my boy. Others like you will 
come, 

Come from their death-beds, to console some sorrow- 
stricken home. 

That clock upon the chamber-wall — its dull voice seems 

to moan, 
Dreaming of him it knew from birth, now dying in 
Argonne. 

Yes, dreams are o'er us all. Across this sweet French 

air to-night 
The dying watch us in their dreams, more seeing than 

our sight. 

A sailor drowns: what meets his ear from far across the 

land? 
Some pleasant sound of dinner things set by his mother's 

hand. 

Ah, swallows, as ye come, ye go ! Life's dream is ending 

now 
For, oh, how many! Is't to heaven that their dear last 

dreams go? 

[ 52 ] 



THE VOICE OF THE SLAVES 



No. As to birds heaven's gates are closed, these dream 

not of the skies. 
'Tis ancient homes and faces loved that float o'er dying 

eyes. 

Their dreams fly nestward. Still they seek the vision 

of the known, 
The loved. O dying hearts, you die in union with your 

own! 



THE VOICE OF THE SLAVES 

By Gilbert Frankau, R.S.A. 

\\T^ ^f^ ihe slaves of the guns, 
^ ' Serjs to the dominant things; 
Ours are the eyes and the ears, 

And the brains of their messagings. 

Ours are the hands that unleash 

The blind gods that raven by night, 
The lords of the terror at dawn 

When the landmarks are blotted from sight 
By the thick curdled churnings of smoke, 

When the lost trenches crumble and spout 
Into loud roaring fountains of flame; 

Till, their prison walls down, with a shout 
And a cheer, ordered line after line. 

Black specks on the barrage of gray 
That we lift — as they leap — to the clock. 

Our infantry storm to the fray. 

[ 53 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



These are our masters, the slim 

Grim muzzles that irk in the pit; 
That chafe for the rushing of wheels, 

For the teams plunging madly to bit 
As the gunners wing down to unkey. 

For the trails sweeping half -circle-right, 
For the six breech-blocks clashing as one 

To a target viewed clear on the sight — 
Gray masses the shells search and tear 

Into fragments that bunch as they run — 
For the hour of the red battle-harvest. 

The dream of the slaves of the gun! 

We have bartered our souls to the guns; 

Every fibre of body and brain 
Have we trained to them, chained to them. Serfs? 

Aye! but proud of the weight of our chain. 
Of our backs that are bowed to their workings. 

To hide them and guard and disguise, 
Of our ears that are deafened with service, 

Of hands that are scarred, and of eyes 
Grown hawklike with marking their prey, 

Of wings that are slashed as with swords 
When we hover, the turn of a blade 

From the death that is sweet to our lords. 

By the ears and the eyes and the brain, 

By the limbs and the hands and the wings. 

We are slaves to our masters the guns; 

But their slaves are the masters of kings! 

[54] 



GUN-TEAMS 



GUN-TEAMS 

By Gilbert Frankau, R.SA. 

rp^HEIR rugs are sodden, their heads are down, their 
^ tails are turned to the storm. 

(Would you know them, you that groomed them in 
the sleek fat days of peace, — 
When the tiles rang to their pawings in the lighted stalls 
and warm, — 
Now the foul clay cakes on breeching-strap and clogs 
the quick-release?) 

The blown rain stings, there is never a star, the tracks 
are rivers of slime. 
(You must harness up by guesswork with a failing 
torch for light. 
Instep-deep in unmade standings, for it's active-service 
time, 
And our resting weeks are over, and we move the 
guns to-night.) 

The iron tires slither, the traces sag; their blind hooves 
stumble and slide; 
They are war-worn, they are weary, soaked with 
sweat and sopped with rain. 
(You must hold them, you must help them, swing your 
lead and centre wide 
Where the greasy granite pave peters out to squelch- 
ing drain.) 

[ 55 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



There is shrapnel bursting a mile in front on the road 
that the guns must take; 
(You are nervous, you are thoughtful, you are shifting 
in your seat. 
As you watch the ragged feathers flicker orange flame 
and break) — 
But the teams are pulling steady down the battered 
village street. 

You have shod them cold, and their coats are long, and 
their bellies gray with the mud; 
They have done with gloss and polish, but the fighting 
heart's unbroke. 
We, who saw them hobbling after us down white roads 
flecked with blood, 
Patient, wondering why we left them, till we lost them 
in the smoke; 

Who have felt them shiver between our knees, when the 
shells rain black from the skies. 
When the bursting terrors find us and the lines 
stampede as one; 
Who have watched the pierced limbs quiver and the pain 
in stricken eyes. 
Know the worth of humble servants, foolish-faithful 
to their gun! 



[ 56 ] 



EYES IN THE AIR 



EYES IN THE AIR 

By Gilbert Frankau, R.S.A. 

/^UR guns are a league behind us, our target a mile 

^-^ below, 

And there's never a cloud to blind us from the haunts of 

our lurking foe — 
Sunk pit whence his shrapnel tore us, support-trench 

crest-concealed, 
As clear as the charts before us, his ramparts lie revealed. 
His panicked watchers spy us, a droning threat in the 

void; 
Their whistling shells outfly us — puff upon puff, deployed 
Across the green beneath us, across the flanking gray. 
In fume and fire to sheathe us and balk us of our prey. 

Below, beyond, above her, 

Their iron web is spun! 
Flicked but unsnared we hover, 

Edged planes against the sun: 
Eyes in the air above his lair. 

The hawks that guide the gun! 

No word from earth may reach us save, white against 

the ground. 
The strips outspread to teach us whose ears are deaf 

to sound: 
But down the winds that sear us, athwart our engine's 

shriek. 
We send — and know they hear us, the ranging guns we 

speak. 

[ 57 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Our visored eyeballs show us their answering pennant, 

broke 
Eight thousand feet below us, a whirl of flame-stabbed 

smoke — 
The burst that hangs to guide us, while numbed gloved 

fingers tap 
From wireless key beside us the circles of the map. 

Line — target — short or over — 
Comes, plain as clock-hands run, 

Word from the birds that hover, 
Unblinded, tail to sun — 

Word out of air to range them fair, 
From hawks that guide the gun! 

Your flying shells have failed you, your landward guns 

are dumb: 
Since earth hath naught availed you, these skies be open! 

Come, 
Where, wild to meet and mate you, flame in their beaks 

for breath. 
Black doves! the white hawks wait you on the wind- 
tossed boughs of death. 
These boughs be cold without you, our hearts are hot 

for this. 
Our wings shall beat about you, our scorching breath 

shall kiss: 
Till, fraught with that we gave you, fulfilled of our desire. 
You bank, — too late to save you from biting beaks of 

fire, — 

[ 58 1 



THE VOICE OF THE GUNS 



Turn sideways from your lover, 
Shudder and swerve and run, 

Tilt; stagger; and plunge over 
Ablaze against the sun, — 

Doves dead in air, who clomb to dare 
The hawks that guide the gun! 



THE VOICE OF THE GUNS 

By Gilbert Frankau, R.S.A. 

WE are the guns, and your masters! Saw ye our 
flashes? 
Heard ye the scream of our shells in the night, and the 

shuddering crashes? 
Saw ye our work by the roadside, the gray wounded 

lying, 
Moaning to God that he made them — the maimed and 

the dying? 

Husbands or sons, 
Fathers or lovers, we break them! We are the guns! 

We are the guns and ye serve us! Dare ye grow weary. 
Steadfast at nighttime, at noontime; or waking, when 

dawn winds blow dreary 
Over the fields and the flats and the reeds of the barrier 

water, 
To wait on the hour of our choosing, the minute decided 

for slaughter? 

Swift the clock runs; 
Yes, to the ultimate second. Stand to your guns! 

[ 59 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



We are the guns and we need you ! Here in the timbered 
Pits that are screened by the crest and the copse where 

at dusk ye unlimbered, 
Pits that one found us — and, finding, gave Ufe (did he 

flinch from the giving?); 
Labored by moonlight when wraith of the dead brooded 

yet o'er the living, 

Ere with the sun's 
Rising the sorrowful spirit abandoned its guns. 

Who but the guns shall avenge him? Strip us for action! 
Load us and lay to the centremost hair of the dial-sight's 

refraction. 
Set your quick hands to our levers to compass the sped 

soul's assoiling; 
Brace your taut limbs to the shock when the thrust of 

the barrel recoiling 

Deafens and stuns! 
Vengeance is ours for our servants. Trust ye the guns! 

Least of our bond-slaves or greatest, grudge ye the 

burden? 
Hard is this service of ours which has only our service 

for guerdon: 
Grow the limbs lax, and unsteady the hands, which 

aforetime we trusted; 
Flawed, the clear crystal of sight; and the clean steel 

of hardihood rusted? 
Dominant ones, 
Are we not tried serfs and proven — true to our guns? 

[ 60] 



THE VOICE OF THE GUNS 



Ye are the guns! Are we worthy? Shall not these speak 

for us, 
Out of the woods where the torn trees are slashed with 

the vain bolts that seek for us, 
Thunder of batteries firing in unison, swish of shell 

flighting. 
Hissing that rushes to silence and breaks to the thud of 

alighting? 

Death that outruns 
Horseman and foot? Are we justified? Answer, O guns! 

Yea! by your works are ye justified, — toil unrelieved; 
Manifold labors, coordinate each to the sending achieved; 
Discipline, not of the feet but the soul, unremitting, 

unfeigned ; 
Tortures unholy by flame and by maiming, known, faced, 

and disdained; 

Courage that shuns 
Only f oolhardiness ; — even by these are ye worthy your 

guns ! 

Wherefore — and unto ye only — power has been given; 
Yea! beyond man, over men, over desolate cities and 

riven ; 
Yea! beyond space, over earth and the seas and the sky's 

high dominions; 
Yea! beyond time, over Hell and the fiends and the 

Death- Angel's pinions! 
Vigilant ones. 
Loose them, and shatter, and spare not. We are the guns! 

[ 61 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE STARS IN THEIR COURSES 

By John Freeman 

A ND now, while the dark vast earth shakes and rocks 
-^^ In this wild dreamlike snare of mortal shocks, 
How look (I muse) those cold and solitary stars 
On these magnificent, cruel wars? — 
Venus, that brushes with her shining lips 
(Surely! ) the wakeful edge of the world and mocks 
With hers its all ungentle wantonness? — 
Or the large moon (pricked by the spars of ships 
Creeping and creeping in their restlessness). 
The moon pouring strange light on things more strange, 
Looks she unheedfully on seas and lands 
Trembling with change and fear of counterchange ? 

O, not earth trembles, but the stars, the stars! 

The sky is shaken and the cool air is quivering. 

I cannot look up to the crowded height 

And see the fair stars trembling in their light. 

For thinking of the starlike spirits of men 

Crowding the earth and with great passion quivering: — 

Stars quenched in anger and hate, stars sick with pity. 

I cannot look up to the naked skies 
Because a sorrow on dark midnight lies. 
Death, on the living world of sense; 
Because on my own land a shadow lies 
That may not rise; 

Because from bare grey hillside and rich city 
Streams of uncomprehending sadness pour, 

[ 62 ] 



THE STARS IN THEIR COURSES 



Thwarting the eager spirit's pure intelligence. . . . 
How look (I muse) those cold and solitary stars 
On these magnificent, cruel wars? 

Stars trembled in broad heaven, faint with pity. 

An hour to dawn I looked. Beside the trees 

Wet mist shaped other trees that branching rose, 

Covering the woods and putting out the stars. 

There was no murmur on the seas, 

No wind blew — only the wandering air that grows 

With dawn, then murmurs, sighs, 

And dies. 

The mist climbed slowly, putting out the stars. 

And the earth trembled when the stars were gone; 

And moving strangely everywhere upon 

The trembling earth, thickened the watery mist. 

And for a time the holy things are veiled. 

England's wise thoughts are swords ; her quiet hours 

Are trodden underfoot like wayside flowers. 

And every English heart is England's wholly. 

In starless night 

A serious passion streams the heaven with light. 

A common beating is in the air — 

The heart of England throbbing everywhere. 

And all her roads are nerves of noble thought, 

And all her people's brain is but her brain; 

And all her history (less her shame) 

Is part of her requickened consciousness. 

Her courage rises clean again; 

Her children's inspiration is her name, her name! 

[ 63 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Even in victory there hides defeat; 

The spirit's murdered though the body survives, 

Except the cause for which a people strives 

Burn with no covetous, foul heat; 

Fights she against herself who infamously draws 

The sword against man's secret spiritual laws. 

But thou, England, because a bitter heel 

Hath sought to bruise the brain, the sensitive will. 

The conscience of the world. 

For this, England, art risen, and shalt fight 

Purely through long profoundest night, 

Making their quarrel thine who are grieved like thee; 

And (if to thee the stars yield victory) 

Tempering their hate of the great foe, that hurled 

Vainly her strength against the conscience of the world, 

Though all their dead be countless as the stars, 

And all the living bitter as the sea. 

I looked again, or dreamed I looked, and saw 

The stars again and all their peace again. 

The moving mist had gone, and shining still 

The moon went high and pale above the hill. 

Not now those lights were trembling in the vast 

Ways of the nervy heaven, nor trembled earth: 

Profound and calm they gazed as the soft-shod hours 

passed. 
And with less fear (not with less awe, 
Remembering, England, all the blood and pain). 
How look, I cried, ye stern and solitary stars 
On these disastrous wars! 



[ 64 ] 



ENGLAND TO FREE MEN 



ENGLAND TO FREE MEN 

By John Galsworthy 

MEN of my blood, you English men! 
From misty hill and misty fen, 
From cot, and town, and plow, and moor, 
Come in — before I shut the door! 
Into my courtyard paved with stones 
That keep the names, that keep the bones, 
Of none but English men who came 
Free of their lives, to guard my fame. 

I am your native land who bred 
No driven heart, no driven head; 
I fly a flag in every sea 
Round the old Earth, of Liberty! 
I am the land that boasts a crown; 
The sun comes up, the sun goes down — 
And never men may say of me 
Mine is a breed that is not free. 

I have a wreath! My forehead wears 
A hundred leaves — a hundred years 
I never knew the words: "You must!" 
And shall my wreath return to dust ? 
Freeman! The door is yet ajar; 
From northern star to southern star, 
O ye who count and ye who delve, 
Come in — before my clock strikes twelve! 

[ 65 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE FATHER 

By Wilfrid Wilson Gibson 

rpHAT was his sort. 
-■- It didn't matter 
What we were at 
But he must chatter 
Of this and that 
His little son 
Had said and done: 
Till, as he told 
The fiftieth time 
Without a change 
How three-year-old 
Prattled a rhyme, 
They got the range 
And cut him short. 

MAD 

By Wilfrid Wilson Gibson 

NECK-DEEP in mud 
He mowed and raved- 
He who had braved 
The field of blood— 

And as a lad 
Just out of school 
Yelled: "April fool!" 
And laughed like mad. 

[66 ] 



RAINING 



RAINING 

By Wilfrid Wilson Gibson 

THE night I left my father said: 
"You'll go and do some stupid thing. 
You've no more sense in that fat head 
Than Silly Billy Witterling. 

"Not sense to come in when it rains — 
Not sense enough for that, you've got. 

You'll get a bullet through your brains, 
Before you know, as like as not." 

And now I'm lying in the trench 

And shells and bullets through the night 

Are raining in a steady drench, 

I'm thinking the old man was right. 



INTO BATTLE 

Flanders, 1915 

By Captain the Hon. Julian Grenfell, D.S.O., 
The Royal Dragoons 

THE naked earth is warm with Spring, 
And with green grass and bursting trees 
Leans to the sun's gaze glorying. 
And quivers in the sunny breeze; 

[ 67 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



And Life is Color and Warmth and Light, 

And a striving evermore for these; 
And he is dead who will not fight; 
And who dies fighting has increase. 

The fighting man shall from the sun 

Take warmth, and life from the glowing earth; 
Speed with the light-foot winds to run. 

And with the trees to newer birth; 
And find, when fighting shall be done, 

Great rest, and fulness after dearth. 

All the bright company of Heaven 

Hold him in their high comradeship, 

The Dog-Star and the Sisters Seven, 
Orion's Belt and sworded hip. 

The woodland trees that stand together. 
They stand to him each one a friend ; 

They gently speak in the windy weather; 
They guide to valley and ridges' end. 

The kestrel hovering by day. 

And the little owls that call by night, 

Bid him be swift and keen as they. 
As keen of ear, as swift of sight. 

The blackbird sings to him. "Brother, brother, 
"If this be the last song you shall sing, 

"Sing well, for you may not sing another, 
"Brother, sing." 

• [ 68 ] 



THE OTHER ARMY 



In dreary, doubtful, waiting hours, 

Before the brazen frenzy starts. 
The horses show him nobler powers; 

O patient eyes, courageous hearts! 

And when the burning moment breaks, 
And all things else are out of mind, 

And only Joy-of -Battle takes 

Him by the throat, and makes him blind. 

Through joy and blindness he shall know, 
Not caring much to know, that still 

Nor lead nor steel shall reach him, so 
That it be not the Destined Will. 

The thundering line of battle stands, 

And in the air Death moans and sings; 

But Day shall clasp him with strong hands, 
And Night shall fold him in soft wings. 

Capt. the Hon. Julian Henry Francis Grenjell, of the ist (Royal) 
Dragoons, and eldest son of Lord Desborough (William Henry Grenfell, 
K. C. V. O.), was wounded in the battle of Ypres, May 13, 191 5, and 
died at Boulogne about a fortnight later, May 25. 



THE OTHER ARMY 

By Bartholomew F. Griffin 

O'ER ruined road past draggled field. 
O'er twisted stones of shaken street, 
Marches an army terrible. 

The army of the bleeding feet, — 

[ 69 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Of skirted feet that now first leave 

Immaculate field and kitchen floor, — 

Old feet that slept beside the hearth, 
Wee feet that twinkled by the door. 

To strange world past the parish line 

(More strange with sound and sight to-day), 

Recruited fast at every hedge, 

The gathering army takes its way. 

Commanders? Aye, they trudge ahead, — 
Not badge but babe on every breast. 

The troops? They straggle at her skirt, 
From tot to crone, in ranks ill-drest. 

And uniformed — in rusty best 

From cedarn chests and linen bags; 

Ah, rough the roads and chill the winds 
To sabots split and sudden rags! 

Equipment? Aye, 'tis furnished well, 
This army of the old and young, — 

On shoulder bent a bundle small, 
A doll from little fingers swung! 

Almost complete — it only lacks 

The battle oath and cheer and song; 

Save infant fret and aged sigh. 
Now dumbly marches it along. 

[ 70 ] 



LITANY OF NATIONS 



Past gaping window, roof and sill 
It fares to red horizon's edge, 

Past blackened furrow, hearth and fane,- 
And fast it grows at every hedge! 



LITANY OF NATIONS 

By William: Griffith 

The nations shall rush Uke the rushing of many waters . . . and shall 
be chased before the wind. — Isaiah. 



Greece 

A EONS of old were wandering down the seas, 
-^"^ When Homer sang at Chios — and the sweet 
Tranquillity of marching silences 
Was broken at my feet. 

Great dawns have shown the way 

When we have wandered. 
God, in the battle sway, 

What have we squandered? 



Italy 

Avid and Roman born in soul and sense. 

Master of all else but myself was I, 
When, bound by silken cords of indolence, 
I saw the world go by. 

[ 71] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



France 

Ravaging, roystering and repenting — save 

In story and the regions of romance, 
Rises the moon on whom more mad and brave, 
Or beautiful than France? 

Germany 

Once German arms and German armies hurled 

Thunders on Rome. Than mine no readier hand 
Would wake the violin and woo the world, 
Were it a fairyland. 

Austria-Hungary 

Mine is a house divided but upheld 

By the sheer force of many hemming powers. 
Ages, like forests, have been hewn and felled 
To build my crumbling towers. 

Russia 

Gray winters flourish and old empires fail; 

And still the starry watchmen sally forth 
As wardens, with me, of the frozen grail 
And ramparts of the north. 

Balkan States 

Stabbing the skies for stars and air in which 

To bask awhile and breathe — shall we remain 
Simply the little brothers of the rich? 
God! have we fought in vain? 

[ 72 ] 



LITANY OF NATIONS 



Spain 

Strong was my soul in war and wise in peace. 

On whom else was the Moslem vanguard hurled ? 
O but for me had any Genoese 

Sailed and brought back a world? 

Switzerland 

High noons and sunsets pass while I repeat 

The world-old secret of the endless quest; 
And with the nations ageing at my feet, 
I overlook the west. 

Great Britain 

Flecking the seas where war and tempest brew, 

And biding till the gonfalons are furled, 
My British sails have dared and driven through 
Thunders that shook the world. 

America y 

Westward the tide of empire ebbs and flows: 

And westward where the new-world torches rise 
And rout the night, the Great Day dawning glows 
And kindles in my eyes. 

Japan 

Amid the warring peoples I that slept 

And dreamt of wide dominion — confident, 
Ambitious, urging, conquering — ^have stept 
Out from the orient. 

C 73 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



China 

Glory and power for ages had been mine, 

Until upon me fell a sudden night, 
Such as makes beacon-star republics shine: 
And my eyes saw the light. 

Turkey 

In infidel debate on whence and why, 

They hiss my God, and know not whether hale 
And wise, or worn and withering am I, 
Behind the crimson veil. 

Great dawns have shown the way 

When we have wandered. 
God, in the battle sway, 

What have we squandered? 



THE PYRES 

By Hermann Hagedorn 

13YRES in the night, in the night! 
"*- And the roaring yellow and red. 
Trooper, trooper, why so white? 

We are out to gather our dead. 
We have brought dry boughs from the bloody wood 

And the torn hill-side; 
We have felled great trunks, wet with the blood 

Of brothers that died; 

[ 74 ] 



THE PYRES 



We have piled them high for a flaming bed, 
Hemlock and ash and pine for a bed, 
A throne in the night, a throne for a bed — 
And we go to gather our dead. 

There where the oaks loom, dark and high. 

Over the sombre hill. 

Body on body, cold and still. 
Under the stars they lie. 
There where the silver river runs. 

Careless and calm as fate. 
Mowed, mowed by the terrible guns, 

The stricken brothers wait. 
There by the smoldering house, and there 
Where the red smoke hangs on the heavy air, 
Under the ruins, under the hedge. 
Cheek by cheek at the forest-edge; 
Back to breast, three men deep, 

Hearing not bugle or drum. 
In the desperate trench they died to keep. 
Under the starry dome they sleep, 

Murmuring, "Brothers, come!" 

This way! I heard a call 

Like a stag's when he dies. 
Under the willows I saw him fall. 

Under the willows he lies. 
Give me your hand. Raise him up. 

Lift his head. Strike a light. 
This morning we shared a crust and a cup. 

He wants no supper to-night. 

[ 75 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Take his feet. Here the shells 

Broke all day long, 
Moaning and shrieking hell's 

Bacchanalian song! 
Last night he helped me bear 

Men to hell's feting. 
To-morrow, maybe, somewhere, 

We, too, shall lie waiting. 

Pyres in the night, in the night! 

Weary and sick and dumb, 
Under the flickering, faint starlight 

The drooping gleaners come. 
Out of the darkness, dim 

Shadowy shadow-bearers. 
Dragging into the bale-fire's rim 

Pallid death-farers. 

Pyres in the night, in the night! 

In the plain, on the hill. 
No volleys for their last rite. 

We need our powder— to kill. 
High on their golden bed. 

Pile up the dead! 

Pyres in the night, in the night! 

Torches, piercing the gloom! 
Look! How the sparks take flight! 

Stars, stars, make room! 

[ 76 ] 



THE REFUGEES 



Smoke, that was bone and blood! 

Hark! the deep roar. 
It is the souls telling God 

The glory of WAR! 



THE REFUGEES 

By Hermann Hagedorn 

WHAT cries, what crashes in the street? 
What riotous madness in the square? 
Oh, frightened heart and flying feet, 

Weeping mother of babes, be fleet! 

Flee like the doe, flee like the hare! 
The terrible hunter is out to slay. 

War, the hunter, with flaming gun! 

His blighting shadow is over the sun. 

To cover, to cover, ye hunted, run! 

Mother and maiden, babe and nun. 
Out of the house and the streets, and away! 

Mother, draw close the babe to your bosom, 

Close, close! Hide him well in your shawl! 
For the battle blight is on bud and blossom. 

And the fairest and frailest are first to fall. 
Father, hold fast your little son's hand, 

Sister, hold fast to the sheltering arm! 
War, the hunter, stalks over the land, 

And his breath is thunder and storm, 

[ 77 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



And trample of hoofs, and murder and pillage, 

Savage eyes and the ruthless blade. 
A roaring forge is the friendly village, 

And hands of hell are the hills where you played. 
Mother, hold close the babe to your breast, 

And flee, flee! For the cannon are loud. 
Cannon to east, cannon to west! 

Look! Falling walls, and a cloud 

Of dust for a shroud 
O'er some one's dearest and best. 
Look! Falling walls, and a spire 

Crumbling to earth! 
Look! Falling walls, and the fire, 

Roaring red mirth. 
Falling walls, 

Withered dreams! 
Cries and calls 

And screams! 
And hither and thither, stricken and bowed, 
The surging and wailing crowd. 

This way, that way, this way for flight! 

All that the years have laid on your heart, 
Through toil and passion and dear delight, 

Crowd on your market-cart. 
And out, out, out of the terrible town. 

Out, from the smoke and the crying, 
Out from the dear walls, crashing down 

Over the living, the dying. 

[ 78 ] 



A HYMN FOR AVIATORS 



Out! And turn not for father or child, 
Lost in the dark and the ravage. 

Out! Ere the golden bowl be defiled 
With the thirsty lips of a savage! 

Out, with your cart-load of despair. 

Out, with your shards of faith! 
Out, with your old dame in her chair. 

Moaning, and crying for death. 
Out, out, out! And whither? Who cares? 

Life is ended. Death is come. 
Vain are your lifted hands, and your prayers. 

God is fallen, God is dumb. 
And we, we ! We are dead. And the roads 

Where the neighbors go with their carts 
Are the roads of the ghosts in hell, and the loads 

They push are their broken hearts. 



A HYMN FOR AVIATORS 

By Mary CD. Hamilton 
(Set to music by C. Hubert H, Parry) 

T ORD, guard and guide the men who fly 
^-^ Through the great spaces of the sky, 
Be with them traversing the air 
In dark'ning storm or sunshine fair. 

[ 79 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Thou who dost keep with tender might 
The balanced birds in all their flight, 
Thou of the tempered winds, be near, 
That, having Thee, they know no fear. 

Control their minds, with instinct fit, 
What time, adventuring, they quit 
The firm security of land; 
Grant stedfast eye and skilful hand. 

Aloft, in solitudes of space. 
Uphold them with Thy saving grace; 
O God, protect the men who fly 
Through lonely ways beneath the sky. 



IN TIME OF THE BREAKING OF NATIONS 

By Thomas Hardy 



/^NLY a man harrowing clods 
^^ In a slow silent walk 
With an old horse that stumbles and nods 
Half asleep as they stalk. 

II. 

Only thin smoke without flame 

From the heaps of couch grass; 

— Yet this will go on just the same 
Tho' dynasties pass. 

[ 80 ] 



SONG OF THE SOLDIERS 



III. 

Yonder a maid and her wight 
Come whispering by; 

War's annals will fade into night 
Ere their story die. 



SONG OF THE SOLDIERS 

By Thomas Hardy 

WHAT of the faith and fire within us 
Men who march away 
Ere the barn-cocks say 
Night is growing gray, 
To hazards whence no tears can win us; 
What of the faith and fire within us 
Men who march away? 

Is it a purblind prank, O think you, 
Friend with the musing eye 
Who watch us stepping by. 
With doubt and dolorous sigh? 

Can much pondering so hoodwink you! 

Is it a purblind prank, O think you. 
Friend with the musing eye? 

[ 81 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Nay. We see well what we are doing, 

Though some may not see — 

Dalliers as they be! — 

England's need are we; 
Her distress would set us ruing: 
Nay. We see well what we are doing, 

Though some may not see! 

In our heart of hearts believing 

Victory crowns the just, 

And that braggarts must 

Surely bite the dust, 
March we to the field ungrieving, 
In our heart of hearts believing 

Victory crowns the just. 

Hence the faith and fire within us 

Men who march away 

Ere the barn-cocks say 

Night is growing gray, 
To hazards whence no tears can win us; 
Hence the faith and fire within us 

Men who march away. 



[ 82 ] 



BELGIUM'S DESTITUTE 



BELGIUM'S DESTITUTE 

By Thomas Hardy 

[This poem, written as an appeal to the American people on behalf 
of the destitute people of Belgium by Thomas Hardy, the English writer, 
was given out by the American Commission for Relief in Belgium 
January 3, igiS-] 

An Appeal to America 

Seven millions stand 
Emaciate, in that ancient Delta-land: — 
We here, full charged with our own maimed and dead, 
And coiled in throbbing conflicts slow and sore, 
Can soothe how slight these ails unmerited 
Of souls forlorn upon the facing shore! 
Where naked, gaunt, in endless band on band 

Seven millions stand. 

No man can say 
To your great country that, with scant delay. 
You must, perforce, ease them in their sore need: 
We know that nearer first your duty lies; 
But — is it much to ask that you let plead 
Your loving kindness with you — wooing wise — 
Albeit that aught you owe and must repay 

No man can say? 

[ 83 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



A SINGSONG OF ENGLAND 

By Maurice Hewlett 

O ENGLAND is an island, 
The fairest ever seen; 
They say men come to England 

To learn that grass is green. 
And Englishmen are now at war, 

All for this, they say. 
That they are free, and other men 
Must be as free as they. 

The Englishmen are shepherds. 

They plow, they sow and reap; 
Their King may wear his leopards. 

His men must run their sheep. 
But now the crook and reaping-hook, 

The coulter and the sieve 
Are thrown aside: they take the gun 

That other men may live. 

Some Englishmen are fishermen. 

And other some are miners, 
And others man the shipping yards 

And build the ocean liners; 
But one and all will down tools 

And up with gun and sword 
To make a stand for Freedom 

Against the War Lord. 

[ 84 ] • 



A SINGSONG OF ENGLAND 



The pretty girls of England 

Are husbanding their charms, 
For not a girl of them but has 

A sweetheart under arms. 
But not a girl of all the flock 

Would call across the waves 
Her sweetheart to her kindness 

While other men are slaves. 

There's been an English kingdom 

For twice a thousand years; 
Her men have plough'd and reap'd it 

Thro' merriment and tears. 
But never a twenty year has passed 

Without some stroke's been given 
For Freedom; and the land is free 

As any under heaven. 

The Roman and the Spaniard, 

The Corsican, have tried 
Their worst, and now the German 

Must perish in his pride. 
He may burn and thieve and slaughter, 

He may scold and storm and pray; 
But we shall fight till even his 

Stand up free men some day. 

When he is free of Germany 

And Germany of him 
There'll be a chance for plain men 

To get old Europe trim. 

[ 85 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Then on, you sturdy English hands, 

And keep the colors flying, 
And we'll not grudge your blessed blood 

If Tyranny's a-dying. 



V. D. F. 

In Memoriam 

By Humbert 

YOU from Givenchy, since no years can harden 
The beautiful dead, when holy twilight reaches 
The sleeping cedar and the copper beeches. 

Return to walk again in Wadham Garden. 

We, growing old, grow stranger to the College, 

Symbol of youth, where we were young together, 
But you, beyond the reach of time and weather, 

Of youth in death forever keep the knowledge. 

We hoard our youth, we hoard our youth, and fear it, 
But you, who freely gave what we have hoarded. 
Are with the final goal of youth rewarded 

The road to travel and the traveler's spirit. 

And therefore, when for us the stars go down. 
Your star is steady over Oxford Town. 



[ 86 ] 



PRAYER FOR PEACE 



N 



PRAYER FOR PEACE 

By William Samuel Johnson 

OW these were visions in the night of war: 

I prayed for peace; God, answering my prayer, 
Sent down a grievous plague on humankind, 
A black and tumorous plague that softly slew 
Till nations and their armies were no more— 

And there was perfect peace . . . 
But I awoke, wroth with high God and prayer. 

I prayed for peace; God, answering my prayer, 
Decreed the Truce of Life:— Wings in the sky 
Fluttered and fell; the quick, bright ocean things 
Sank to the ooze; the footprints in the woods 
Vanished; the freed brute from the abattoir 
Starved on green pastures; and within the blood 
The death-work at the root of living ceased; 
And men gnawed clods and stones, blasphemed and died- 

And there was perfect peace . . . 
But I awoke, wroth with high God and prayer. 

I prayed for peace; God, answering my prayer, 
Bowed the free neck beneath a yoke of steel. 
Dumbed the free voice that springs in lyric speech, 
Killed the free art that glows on all mankind, 

[ 87 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



And made one iron nation lord of earth, 
Which in the monstrous matrix of its will 
Moulded a spawn of slaves. There was One Might- 

And there was perfect peace ... 
But I awoke, wroth with high God and prayer. 

I prayed for peace; God, answering my prayer. 
Palsied all flesh with bitter fear of death. 
The shuddering slayers fled to town and field 
Beset with carrion visions, foul decay. 
And sickening taints of air that made the earth 
One charnel of the shrivelled lines of war. 
And through all flesh that omnipresent fear 
Became the strangling fingers of a hand 
That choked aspiring thought and brave belief 
And love of loveliness and selfless deed 
Till flesh was all, flesh wallowing, styed in fear, 
In festering fear that stank beyond the stars — 

And there was perfect peace . . . 
But I awoke, wroth with high God and prayer. 

I prayed for peace; God, answering my prayer, 

Spake very softly of forgotten things. 

Spake very softly old remembered words 

Sweet as young starlight. Rose to heaven again 

The mystic challenge of the Nazarene, 

That deathless affirmation: — Man in God 

And God in man willing the God to be . . . 

And there was war and peace, and peace and war, 

Full year and lean, joy, anguish, life and death. 

Doing their work on the evolving soul, 

[88] 



THE CALL TO THE COLORS 



The soul of man in God and God in man. 

For death is nothing in the sum of things, 

And life is nothing in the sum of things, 

And flesh is nothing in the sum of things, 

But man in God is all and God in man. 

Will merged in will, love immanent in love, 

Moving through visioned vistas to one goal — 

The goal of man in God and God in man, 

And of all life in God and God in life — 

The far fruition of our earthly prayer, 

"Thy will be done ! " . . . There is no other peace! 



THE CALL TO THE COLORS 

By Sara Beaumont Kennedy 

T IKE the seeds of wind-flowers, lightly blown 

■*— ^ On vagrant, gipsying breeze, 

They are scattered wide throughout our land — 

Aliens from over the seas. 
They came from the crowded fatherlands 

To share in our broader sphere. 
And they built their nests and reared their broods 

Through many a changing year. 

But a vibrant cry comes unaware 

From over the crested wave — 
The voice of the warring motherlands 

Calling their children to save: 

[ 89 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"On our grain-grown fields War plants its guns 
And lights its torch on the crag; 

We need you, sons in the Other Lands, 
Come back and fight for the flag!" 

And deep in each listener's heart there stirs 

A memory that has slept 
'Neath blush of blossom and pallor of snows 

While the years have onward crept; 
And he sees in a flash his native hut, 

Where the foeman's banners float — 
And he's German again, or French, or Slav 

At thrill of a bugle-note! 

For a man may wander across the world 

And dwell 'neath a stranger's sky, 
But the call of the blood will cleave all space 

When it comes in a battle-cry; 
And the nest he built and the brood he reared 

Are left to an alien flag 
While he turns him home, with his soul aflame. 

To die for a silken rag. 



NO MAN'S LAND 

By J. Knight-Adkin 

XTO Man's Land is an eerie sight 

-^ ^ At early dawn in the pale gray light. 

Never a house and never a hedge 

In No Man's Land from edge to edge, 

[90] 



NO MAN'S LAND 



And never a living soul walks there 
To taste the fresh of the morning air. 
Only some lumps of rotting clay, 
That were friends or foemen yesterday. 

What are the bounds of No Man's Land? 
You can see them clearly on either hand, 
A mound of rag-bags gray in the sun, 
Or a furrow of brown where the earth works run 
From the eastern hills to the western sea, 
Through field or forest o'er river and lea; 
No man may pass them, but aim you well 
And Death rides across on the bullet or shell. 

But No Man's Land is a goblin sight 

When patrols crawl over at dead o' night; 

Boche or British, Belgian or French, 

You dice with death when you cross the trench. 

When the "rapid", like fireflies in the dark. 

Flits down the parapet spark by spark, 

And you drop for cover to keep your head 

With your face on the breast of the four months' dead. 

The man who ranges in No Man's Land 
Is dogged by the shadows on either hand 
When the star-shell's flare, as it bursts o'erhead, 
Scares the great gray rats that feed on the dead, 
And the bursting bomb or the bayonet-snatch 
May answer the click of your safety-catch. 
For the lone patrol, with his life in his hand, 
Is hunting for blood in No Man's Land. 

[ 91 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



GERMAN PRISONERS 

By Joseph Lee, Sergeant, The Black Watch 

WHEN first I saw you in the curious street, 
Like some platoon of soldier ghosts in grey, 
My mad impulse was all to smite and slay, 
To spit upon you — tread you 'neath my feet. 
But when I saw how each sad soul did greet 
My gaze with no sign of defiant frown. 
How from tired eyes looked spirits broken down, 
How each face showed the pale flag of defeat, 
And doubt, despair, and disillusionment, 
And how were grievous wounds on many a head, 
And on your garb red-faced was other red; 
And how you stooped as men whose strength was spent, 
I knew that we had suffered each as other, 
And could have grasped your hand and cried, "My 
brother!" 

Sergeant Joseph Lee, in speaking of his poem "German Prisoners," 
states: "During two years of campaigning in France and Belgium, I 
have never seen, after the heat of action, anything transpire between 
ourselves and the captured enemy that was opposed to its spirit." 

THE CALL TO ARMS IN OUR STREETS 

By W. M. Letts 

rpHERE'S a woman sobs her heart out, 
'- With her head against the door. 
For the man that's called to leave her, 
— God have pity on the poor! 

[92 ] 



THE CALL TO ARMS IN OUR STREETS 

But it's beat, drums, beat, 
While the lads march down the street, 
And it's blow, trumpets, blow, 
Keep your tears until they go. 

There's a crowd of little children 
That march along and shout, 
For it's fine to play at soldiers 
Now their fathers are called out. 

So it's beat, drums, beat; 

But who'll find them food to eat? 

And it's blow, trumpets, blow, 

Ah! the children little know. 

There's a mother who stands watching 
For the last look of her son, 
A worn poor widow woman, 
And he her only one. 

But it's beat, drums, beat, 

Though God knows when we shall meet; 

And it's blow, trumpets, blow. 

We must smile and cheer them so. 

There's a young girl who stands laughing, 
For she thinks a war is grand, 
And it's fine to see the lads pass. 
And it's fine to hear the band. 

So it's beat, drums, beat. 

To the fall of many feet; 

And it's blow, trumpets, blow, 

God go with you where you go 

To the war. 

C 93 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE SPIRES OF OXFORD 
By W. M. Letts 

T SAW the spires of Oxford 
-*■ As I was passing by, 
The gray spires of Oxford 

Against a pearl-gray sky. 
My heart was with the Oxford men 

Who went abroad to die. 

The years go fast in Oxford, 
The golden years and gay. 

The hoary Colleges look down 
On careless boys at play. 

But when the bugles sounded war 
They put their games away. 

They left the peaceful river, 
The cricket-field, the quad. 

The shaven lawns of Oxford 
To seek a bloody sod — 

They gave their merry youth away 
For country and for God. 

God rest you, happy gentlemen, 
Who laid your good lives down, 

Who took the khaki and the gun 
Instead of cap and gown. 

God bring you to a fairer place 
Than even Oxford town. 

[94] 



CHAPLAIN TO THE FORCES 



CHAPLAIN TO THE FORCES 

By W. M. Letts 



"I have once more to remark upon the devotion to duty, courage, and 
contempt of danger which has characterized the work of the Chaplains 
of the Army throughout this campaign." — Sir John French, in the 
Neuve Chapelle Dispatch. 



A MBASSADOR of Christ you go 
-^*- Up to the very gates of Hell, 
Through fog of powder, storm of shell, 
To speak your Master's message: "Lo, 
The Prince of Peace is with you still, 
His peace be with you. His good-will." 



It is not small, your priesthood's price. 

To be a man and yet stand by, 

To hold your life while others die. 

To bless, not share the sacrifice. 

To watch the strife and take no part — 

You with the fire at your heart. 

But yours, for our great Captain Christ 

To know the sweat of agony, 

The darkness of Gethsemane, 

In anguish for these souls unpriced. 

Vicegerent of God's pity you, 

A sword must pierce your own soul through. 

[95 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



In the pale gleam of new-born day, 
Apart in some tree-shadowed place, 
Your altar but a packing-case, 
Rude as the shed where Mary lay, 
Your sanctuary the rain-drenched sod, 
You bring the kneeling soldier God. 

As sentinel you guard the gate 
'Twixt life and death, and unto death 
Speed the brave soul whose failing breath 
Shudders not at the grip of Fate, 
But answers, gallant to the end, 
"Christ is the Word — and I his friend." 

Then God go with you, priest of God, 
For all is well and shall be well. 
What tho you tread the roads of Hell, 
Your Captain these same ways has trod. 
Above the anguish and the loss 
Still floats the ensign of His Cross. 



THE BOMBARDMENT 

By Amy Lowell 

SLOWLY, without force, the rain drops into the city. 
It stops a moment on the carved head of Saint John, 
then slides on again, slipping and trickling over his stone 
cloak. It splashes from the lead conduit of a gargoyle, 
and falls from it in turmoil on the stones in the Cathedral 
Square. Where are the people, and why does the fretted 

[ 96 ] 



THE BOMBARDMENT 



steeple sweep about in the sky? Boom! the sound 
swings against the rain. Boom, again! After it, only 
water rushing in the gutters, and the turmoil from the 
spout of the gargoyle. Silence. Ripples and mutters. 
Boom! 

The room is damp, but warm. Little flashes swarm 
about from the fire-light. The lustres of the chandelier 
are bright, and clusters of rubies leap in the Bohemian 
glasses on the itaghe. Her hands are restless, but the 
white masses of her hair are quite still. Boom! Will it 
never cease to torture, this iteration! Boom! The 
vibration shatters a glass on the etagere. It lies there 
formless and glowing, with all its crimson gleams shot 
out of pattern, spilled, flowing red, blood-red. A thin 
bell-note pricks through the silence. A door creaks. The 
old lady speaks: ^'Victor, clear away that broken glass." 
"Alas! Madame, the Bohemian glass!" "Yes, Victor, 
one hundred years ago my father brought it — " Boom! 
The room shakes, the servitor quakes. Another goblet 
shivers and breaks. Boom! 

It rustles at the window-pane, — the smooth, streaming 
rain, and he is shut within its clash and murmur. Inside 
is his candle, his table, his ink, his pen, and his dreams. 
He is thinking, and the walls are pierced with beams of 
sunshine, slipping through young green. A fountain 
tosses itself up at the blue sky, and through the spattered 
water in the basin he can see copper carp, lazily floating 
among cold leaves. A wind-harp in a cedar-tree grieves 
and whispers, and words blow into his brain, bubbled, 
iridescent, shooting up like flowers of fire, higher and 

[ 97 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



higher. Boom! The flame-flowers snap on their slender 
stems. The fountain rears up in long broken spears of 
disheveled water and flattens into the earth. Boom! 
And there is only the room, the table, the candle, and the 

sliding rain. Again, Boom! Boom! '■ Boom! 

He stuffs his fingers into his ears. He sees corpses, and 
cries out in fright. Boom! It is night, and they are 
shelling the city! Boom! Boom! 

A child wakes and is afraid, and weeps in the darkness. 
What has made the bed shake? ''Mother, where are 
you? I am awake." "Hush, my Darling, I am here." 
"But, Mother, something so queer happened, the room 
shook." Boom! "Oh! What is it? What is the 
matter?" Boom! "Where is Father? I am so afraid." 
Boom! The child sobs and shrieks. The house trembles 
and creaks. Boom! 

Retorts, globes, tubes, and phials lie shattered. All 
his trials oozing across the floor. The life that was his 
choosing, lonely, urgent, goaded by a hope, all gone. A 
weary man in a ruined laboratory, that was his story. 
Boom! Gloom and ignorance, and the jig of drunken 
brutes. Diseases like snakes crawling over the earth, 
leaving trails of slime. Wails from people burying their 
dead. Through the window he can see the rocking 
steeple. A ball of fire falls on the lead of the roof, and 
the sky tears apart on a spike of flame. Up the spire, 
behind the lacings of stone, zig-zagging in and out of the 
carved tracings, squirms the fire. It spouts like yellow 
wheat from the gargoyles, coils round the head of Saint 

[98 ] 



THE BOMBARDMENT 



John, and aureoles him in light. It leaps into the night 
and hisses against the rain. The Cathedral is a burning 
stain on the white, wet night. 

Boom ! The Cathedral is a torch, and the houses next 
to it begin to scorch. Boom! The Bohemian glass on 
the etagere is no longer there. Boom! A stalk of flame 
sways against the red damask curtains. The old lady 
cannot walk. She watches the creeping stalk and counts. 
Boom! Boom! Boom! 

The poet rushes into the street, and the rain wraps 
him in a sheet of silver. But it is threaded with gold and 
powdered with scarlet beads. The city burns. Quiver- 
ing, spearing, thrusting, lapping, streaming, run the 
flames. Over roofs, and walls, and shops, and stalls. 
Smearing its gold on the sky, the fire dances, lances itself 
through the doors, and lisps and chuckles along the floors. 

The child wakes again and screams at the yellow- 
petaled flower flickering at the window. The little red 
lips of flames creep along the ceiling beams. 

The old man sits among his broken experiments and 
looks at the burning Cathedral. Now the streets are 
swarming with people. They seek shelter, and crowd 
into cellars. They shout and call, and over all, slowly 
and without force, the rain drops into the city. Boom! 
And the steeple crashes down among the people. Boom! 
Boom, again! The water rushes along the gutters. The 
fire roars and mutters. Boom! 

[ 99 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



FRANCE 

By Percy Mackaye 

T TALF artist and half anchorite, 
-■- -^ Part siren and part Socrates, 
Her face — alluring and yet recondite — 

Smiled through her salons and academies. 

Lightly she wore her double mask, 
Till sudden, at war's kindling spark. 

Her inmost self, in shining mail and casque, ' 
Blazed to the world her single soul — 
Jeanne d'Arc! 



SONNETS 

By Percy Mackaye 

Doubt 

OO thin, so frail the opalescent ice 

^ Where yesterday, in lordly pageant, rose 

The monumental nations — the repose 

Of continents at peace! Realities 

Solid as earth they seemed; yet in a trice 

Their bastions crumbled in the surging floes 

Of unconceivable, inhuman woes. 

Gulfed in a mad, unmeaning sacrifice. 

[ 100 ] 



SONNETS 



We, who survive that world-quake, cower and start, 

Searching our hidden souls with dark surmise: 

So thin, so frail — is reason? Patient art — 

Is it all a mockery, and love all lies? 

Who sees the lurking Hun in childhood's eyes? 

Is hell so near to every human heart? 

Destiny 

We are what we imagine, and our deeds 
Are born of dreaming. Europe acts to-day 
Epics that little children in their play 
Conjured, and statesmen murmured in their creeds; 
In barrack, court and school were sown those seeds, 
Like Dragon's teeth, which ripen to affray 
Their sowers. Dreams of slaughter rise to slay, 
And fate itself is stuff that fancy breeds. 

Mock, then, no more at dreaming, lest our own 

Create for us a like reality! 

Let not imagination's soil be sown 

With armed men but justice, so that we 

May for a world of tyranny atone 

And dream from that despair — democracy. 

Rheims 

Apollo mourns another Parthenon 

In ruins! — Is the God of Love awake? 

And we — must we behold the world's heart break 

For peace and beauty ravished, and look on 

[ 101 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Dispassionate? — Rheims' gloried fane is gone: 
Not by a planet's rupture, nor the quake 
Of subterranean titans, but to slake 
The vengeance of a Goth Napoleon. 

O Time, let not the anguish numb or pall 

Of that remembrance! Let no callous heal 

Our world-wound, till our kindled pities call 

The parliament of nations, and repeal 

The vows of war. Till then, pain keep us thrall! 

More bitter than to battle — is to feel. 



CHRISTMAS, 1915 

By Percy Mackaye 

XTOW is the midnight of the nations: dark 
-^ ^ Even as death, beside her blood-dark seas, 
Earth, like a mother in birth agonies. 
Screams in her travail, and the planets hark 
Her million-throated terror. Naked, stark, 
Her torso writhes enormous, and her knees 
Shudder against the shadowed Pleiades, 
Wrenching the night's imponderable arc. 

Christ! What shall be delivered to the morn 

Out of these pangs, if ever indeed another 

Morn shall succeed this night, or this vast mother 

Survive to know the blood-sprent offspring, torn 

From her racked flesh? — What splendor from the 

smother? 
What new-wing'd world, or mangled god still-born? 

' [ 102 ] 



ITALIAN SOLDIERS 



ITALIAN SOLDIERS 

By Queen Maegherita 

/^H, Fatherland, our Fatherland, forever wilt thou be 
^^ Deserving of the holy love thy children bear to 

thee. 
Behold them armed for thy defense, and eager for thy 

sake 
To fare where war's appalling blasts like tempests round 

them break. 
Content with any sacrifice tho Death be close at hand, 
Because of their devoted love for thee, their Fatherland. 

Tho perils compass them about, tho foes in legions rise, 
They see the star of Italy shine clearly in the skies. 
And with the courage that it brings, their blood they 

freely shed. 
Each drop a gem that well may grace the crown upon 

thy head; 
And while that star holds out to shine its light will not 

depart, 
To leave in darkness and despair the brave Italian heart. 

Beneath their glorious uniforms their bosoms nobly thrill 
With all the lofty sentiments their country can instil. 
For ever have their eyes been turned to every far frontier 
Where haply an invading host of foemen might appear. 
These are the men who make you great, who, loyal, firm, 

and true. 
Have dared to do the mighty deeds we dreamed that they 

would do. 

[ 103 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



And when the time of peace has come and wondering 

children see 
The scars the war-worn patriots received — for Italy — 
They, too, shall be inspired to deeds upon the field of war 
To match the glorious record that their fathers made 

before. 
Let all who see the colors pass with heads uncovered stand 
And reverence these protectors of the glorious Fatherland. 

Oh, Italy — the sweetest name the brave Italian speaks 

As he patrols thy shining seas, or watches from thy peaks. 

Their country is their life, their all — let every woman's 
prayer 

Arise to God to bless them, and the mighty arms they 
bear. 

Oh, Sun which gilds our lovely land from shore to sea- 
washed shore, 

Was ever more inspiring sight than these — our men 
of war? 

O GLORIOUS FRANCE! 

By Edgar Lee Masters 

"VrOU have become a forge of snow white fire, 
^ A crucible of molten steel, O France ! 
Your sons are stars who cluster to a dawn 
And fade in light for you, O glorious France ! 
They pass through meteor changes with a song 
Which to all islands and all continents 
Says life is neither comfort, wealth, nor fame. 
Nor quiet hearthstones, friendship, wife nor child, 

[ 104 ] 



O GLORIOUS FRANCE 



Nor love, nor youth's delight, nor manhood's power, 
Nor many days spent in a chosen work, 
Nor honored merit, nor the patterned theme 
Of daily labor, nor the crowns nor wreaths 
Of seventy years. 

These are not all of life, 
O France, whose sons amid the rolling thunder 
Of cannon stand in trenches where the dead 
Clog the ensanguined ice. But life to these 
Prophetic and enraptured souls is vision. 
And the keen ecstasy of fated strife, 
And divination of the loss as gain, 
And reading mysteries with brightened eyes 
In fiery shock and dazzling pain before 
The orient splendor of the face of Death, 
As a great light beside a shadowy sea; 
And in a high will's strenuous exercise. 
Where the warmed spirit finds its fullest strength 
And is no more afraid. And in the stroke 
Of azure lightning when the hidden essence 
And shifting meaning of man's spiritual worth 
And mystical significance in time 
Are instantly distilled to one clear drop 
Which mirrors earth and heaven. 

This is life 
Flaming to heaven in a minute's span 
When the breath of battle blows the smoldering spark. 
And across these seas 

We who cry Peace and treasure life and cling 
To cities, happiness, or daily toil 

[ 105 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



For daily bread, or trail the long routine 
Of seventy years, taste not the terrible wine 
Whereof you drink, who drain and toss the cup 
Empty and ringing by the finished feast; 
Or have it shaken from your hand by sight 
Of God against the olive woods. 

As Joan of Arc amid the apple trees 

With sacred joy first heard the voices, then 

Obeying plunged at Orleans in a field 

Of spears and lived her dream and died in fire, 

Thou, France, hast heard the voices and hast lived 

The dream and known the meaning of the dream, 

And read its riddle: How the soul of man 

May to one greatest purpose make itself 

A lens of clearness, how it loves the cup 

Of deepest truth, and how its bitterest gall 

Turns sweet to soul's surrender. 

And you say: 
Take days for repetition, stretch your hands 
For mocked renewal of familiar things: 
The beaten path, the chair beside the window, 
The crowded street, the task, the accustomed sleep, 
And waking to the task, or many springs 
Of lifted cloud, blue water, flowering fields — 
The prison house grows close no less, the feast 
A place of memory sick for senses dulled 
Down to the dusty end where pitiful Time 
Grown weary cries Enough! 

Reprinted by permission of the publishers, The Macmillan Company, 
from Edgar Lee Masters' "Songs and Satires." 

[ 106 ] 



SUMMER IN ENGLAND, 19 14 



SUMMER IN ENGLAND, 1914 

By Alice Meynell 

f~\^ London fell a clearer light; 
^-^ Caressing pencils of the sun 
Defined the distances, the white 

Houses transfigured one by one, 
The "long, unlovely street" impearled. 
O what a sky has waked the world! 

Most happy year! And out of town 

The hay was prosperous, and the wheat; 

The silken harvest climbed the down; 

Moon after moon was heavenly sweet. 

Stroking the bread within the sheaves, 

Looking twixt apples and their leaves. 

And while this rose made round her cup. 
The armies died convulsed; and when 

This chaste young silver sun went up 
Softly, a thousand shattered men, 

One wet corruption, heaped the plain. 

After a league-long throb of pain. 

Flower following tender flower, and birds, 
And berries ; and benignant skies 

Made thrive the serried flocks and herds. 
Yonder are men shot through the eyes. 

And children crushed. Love, hide thy face 

From man's unpardonable race. 

[ 107 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



A Reply 

Who said "No man hath greater love than this 

To die to serve his friend?" 
So these have loved us all unto the end. 
Chide thou no more, O thou unsacrificed! 
The soldier dying dies upon a kiss, 
The very kiss of Christ. 



KITCHENER 

By Christopher Morley 

NO man in England slept, the night he died: 
The harsh, stern spirit passed without a pang, 
And freed of mortal clogs his message rang. 
In every wakeful mind the challenge cried: 
Think not of me: one servant less or more 
Means nothing now: hold fast the greater thing — 
Strike hard, love truth, serve England and the King! 

Servant of England, soldier to the core. 
What does it matter where his body fall? 
What does it matter where they build the tomb? 
Five million meii, from Calais to Khartoum, 
These are his wreath and his memorial. 



[ 108 ] 



THE GIFT OF INDIA 



THE GIFT OF INDIA 

By Sarojini Naidu 

IS there aught you need that my hands withhold, 
Rich gifts of raiment or grain or gold? 
Lo ! I have flung to the East and West 
Priceless treasures torn from my breast, 
And yielded the sons of my stricken womb 
To the drum-beats of duty, the sabres of doom. 

Gathered like pearls in their alien graves 

Silent they sleep by the Persian waves; 

Scattered like shells on Egyptian sands, 

They lie with pale brows and brave, broken hands; 

They are strewn like blossoms mown down by chance 

On the blood-brown meadows of Flanders and France. 

Can ye measure the grief of the tears I weep 

Or compass the woe of the watch I keep? 

Or the pride that thrills thro' my heart's despair 

And the hope that comforts the anguish of prayer? 

And the far, sad, glorious vision I see 

Of the torn red banners of Victory? 

When the terror and tumult of hate shall cease 

And life be refashioned on anvils of peace. 

And your love shall offer memorial thanks 

To the comrades who fought in your dauntless ranks. 

And you honor the deeds of the deathless ones. 

Remember the blood of my martyred sons! 

[ 109 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE VIGIL 

By Henry Newbolt 

ENGLAND! where the sacred flame 
Burns before the inmost shrine, 
Where the lips that love thy name 

Consecrate their hopes and thine, 
Where the banners of thy dead 
Weave their shadows overhead, 
Watch beside thine arms to-night, • 
Pray that God defend the Right. 

Think that when to-morrow comes 

War shall claim command of all. 
Thou must hear the roll of drums. 

Thou must hear the trumpet's call. 
Now before they silence ruth. 
Commune with the voice of truth; 
England! on thy knees to-night 
Pray that God defend the Right. 

Single-hearted, unafraid. 

Hither all thy heroes came, 
On this altar's steps were laid 

Gordon's life and Outram's fame. 
England! if thy will be yet 
By their great example set, 
Here beside thine arms to-night 
Pray that God defend the Right. 

[ 110 ] 



A CAROL FROM FLANDERS 



So shalt thou when morning comes 

Rise to conquer or to fall, 
Joyful hear the rolling drums, 

Joyful hear the trumpets call. 
Then let memory tell thy heart 
"England! what thou wert, thou art!" 
Gird thee with thine ancient might, 
Forth! and God defend the Right! 

From "Poems New and Old" {John Murray), by permission of the 
author. 



A CAROL FROM FLANDERS 

By Frederick Niven 

T N Flanders on the Christmas morn 
^ The trenched foemen lay, 
The German and the Briton born — 
And it was Christmas Day. 

The red sun rose on fields accurst, 
The gray fog fled away; 

But neither cared to fire the first, 
For it was Christmas Day. 

They called from each to each across 

The hideous disarray 
(For terrible had been their loss): 

"O, this is Christmas Day!" 

[ 111 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Their rifles all they set aside, 

One impulse to obey; 
'Twas just the men on either side, 

Just men — and Christmas Day. 

They dug the graves for all their dead 

And over them did pray; 
And Englishmen and German said: 

"How strange a Christmas Day!" 

Between the trenches then they met. 
Shook hands, and e'en did play 

At games on which their hearts are set 
On happy Christmas Day. 

Not all the Emperors and Kings, 

Financiers, and they 
Who rule us could prevent these things- 

For it was Christmas Day. 

O ye who read this truthful rime 
From Flanders, kneel and say: 

God speed the time when every day 
Shall be as Christmas Day. 



[ 112 ] 



FORWARD 



FORWARD 

By Alfred Noyes 

A THOUSAND creeds and battle-cries, 
-^*- A thousand warring social schemes, 
A thousand new moralities, 

And twenty thousand thousand dreams. 

Each on his own anarchic way. 

From the old order breaking jree — 

Our ruined world desires, you say, 
License, once more, not liberty. 

But ah, beneath the struggling foam. 

When storm and change are on the deep, 

How quietly the tides come home. 

And how the depths of sea-shine sleep; 

And we who march toward a goal. 

Destroying only to fulfil 
The law, the law of that great soul 

Which moves beneath your alien will; 

We, that like foemen meet the past 
Because we bring the future, know 

We only fight to achieve at last 
A great reunion with our foe; 

Reunion in the truths that stand 

When all our wars are rolled away; 

Reunion of the heart and hand 

And of the prayers wherewith we pray; 

[ 113 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Reunion in the common needs, 

The common strivings of mankind; 

Reunion of our warring creeds 

In the one God that dwells behind . . . 

Forward! — what use in idle words? 

Forward, O warriors of the soul! 
There will be breaking up of swords 

When that new morning makes us whole. 



THE SEARCHLIGHTS 

By Alfred Noyes 

"Political morality differs from individual morality, because there is no 
power above the State." — General vonBernhardi. 

OHADOW by shadow, stripped for fight, 
^^ The lean black cruisers search the sea. 
Nightlong their level shafts of light 
Revolve and find no enemy. 
Only they know each leaping wave 
May hide the lightning and their grave! 

And in the land they guard so well 

Is there no silent watch to keep? 

An age is dying, and the bell 

Rings midnight on a vaster deep; 

But over all its waves once more 

The searchlights move from shore to shore. 

[ 114 ] 



THE SEARCH-LIGHTS 



And captains that we thought were dead, 
And dreamers that we thought were dumb, 
And voices that we thought were fled. 
Arise and call us — and we come: 
And "Search in thine own soul," they cry, 
"For there, too, lurks thine enemy." 

Search for the foe in thine own soul: 
The sloth, the intellectual pride, 
The trivial jest that veils the goal 
For which our fathers lived and died; 
The lawless dreams, the cynic art. 
That rend thy nobler self apart! 

Not far, not far into the night 
These level swords of light can pierce; 
Yet for her faith does England fight — 
Her faith in this our universe, 
Believing Truth and Justice draw 
From founts of everlasting law. 

Therefore a Power above the State — 
The unconquerable Power, returns. 
The fire, the fire that made her great. 
Once more upon her altar burns. 
Once more, redeemed and healed and whole, 
She moves to the Eternal Goal. 



[ 115 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



A PRAYER IN TIME OF WAR 

By Alfred Noyes 

npHOU whose deep ways are in the sea, 
-*- Whose footsteps are not known, 
To-night a world that turned from Thee 
Is waiting — at Thy Throne. 

The towering Babels that we raised 

Where scoffing sophists brawl. 
The little Antichrists we praised — 

The night is on them all. 

The fool hath said. . . . The fool hath said. 

And we, who deemed him wise. 
We, who believed that Thou wast dead. 

How should we seek Thine eyes? 

How should we seek to Thee for power. 

Who scorned Thee yesterday? 
How should we kneel in this dread hour? 

Lord, teach us how to pray. 

Grant us the single heart once more 

That mocks no sacred thing, 
The sword of Truth our fathers wore 

When Thou wast Lord and King. 

Let darkness unto darkness tell 

Our deep unspoken prayer; 
For, while our souls in darkness dwell, 

We know that Thou art there. 

[ 116 ] 



1915 

By James OpPENBmiM: 

HANG the hills with black, 
And blacken the early violets with the blood of 
the young: 
What want we with a Spring of fragrant farmlands, 
Gardens, smokes of the brush, 
And healing rains? 
Let the birds, the winds and the sea 
Sing no more the loves of mating, and the marriage chants 

of Spring . . . 
But mournfully pipe dirges of broad-cast tragic death. 

What want we with the Spring? 

We have cast in roaring foundries the dark-bored steel, 

And like gods have snatched the chemical might of the 

Earth, 
And devised a killing and a crime . . . 

Out of the murder of our hearts, we have wrought great 

havoc. . . . 
Sinking of ships at sea, and the toppling of cities. 
And the mowing of living hosts ! 
What want we with the Spring? 
Patiently the millions wrought: 
With sacrificial hands, and suffering vision. 
Chaos became a city, a ship, a school . . . 

[ 117 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Up was lifted the child, and the young mind scrutinized 

That not a life might be lost . . . 

How unfold these buds? how grow these possibilities? 

Steadily the gates of pain were battered, 

And the gates of darkness assailed, 

And the waste of the spirit striven with. 

And the young went forth crying: Spring! Spring! 
Hope dawns! A glory! 
We are shaping a marvel in the skies ! 
Man becomes god: this is the morning and the first day 
of Creation! 

Spring? 

The hosts contend together: 
Cities are become dust-heaps: 
The young god, the Creator, 
Has turned fury and fiend, the Destroyer ... 
Strange sowing of seed goes on: 

This is the year when we sow the Earth with the flesh of 
the young men . . . 

Black! black! black! 

We have blasted away in a day, 

Our own children. 

Our own creation ... 

We have gone mad, killing the young. 
Slaying the hope of the world . . . 
Now youth leaves his dream and his toil and his quicken- 
ing love 
To kill or to die . . . 

[ 118 ] 



I9I5 



short-lived generation! 
Debauch of blood! 
Folly and sin! 

No more of it! 

Take away Spring, and give over the planet to a moon's 

death, a frozen death: 
Our Earth deserves extinction, 
With her rotten breed of men . . . 

So I cried, and in rage and grief went forth through the 

city. 
The New- World City of Peace . . . 

1 passed a prison . . . 

Broken men decayed in the damp ... 

I passed a mill . . . 

Children and pale women peered wistfully from the 

windows . . . 
I passed a hospital . . . 

Human wreckage sunned there beside the morgue. 
I walked through stinking slums . . . 
Children nosed in the garbage. 

Then I went to the home of a friend. 

And found darkness . . . 

Husband and wife were slowly slaying each other: 

Slaying with love. 

The woman whispered to me: 

"God! Could I go to the war — go to the war and be 
killed!" 

[ 119 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Then I looked in my own breast, 

And I said: What war is this I am bitter against? 

Behold, the lyddite of my soul that destroys peace 
about me, 

Behold, the bayonet of my hate, and the shrapnel of my 
bestiality: 

The contending armies of lusts and shames and intrigues: 

The sentries of dark sins: the spies of despisal . . . 

In this little world of Self I saw the big: 

In my own breast I found war and disaster and ship 
sinking. 

The death of faith and of hope . . . 

Behold, in myself I found Man: 

Who since the beginning has been this advancing con- 
flict ... 

Ever thus ... 

Then is it marvel no peace is on Earth? 

Where is the Man of Peace? 

Shall I be crushed then by the obvious horror of blood 

and carrion? 
By wholesale carnage? 

Dark in the world of darkness, I left the city: 

And then I saw, 

O ancient and new miracle . . . 

Resistless, laughing at death, overruling decay, 

Earth silently lifted life . . . 

Impassive and calm lay the heaps of the hills, 

And steadily rising, 

C 120 ] 



I9I5 



Green pierced through, and the soil steamed, and the 

birds nested. 
There was the farmer-boy plowing, 
And there the young wife airing the house. 
And close to the handled mud the absorbed faces of 

children . . . 
Lo, thought I, Earth holds to her hope ! 

Then I greeted the hills . . . 

O let them be mantled with green, I said, 

And let beauty hang from the boughs . . . 

Increase the laughter of children. 

String the cities with color and glory, 

Lift a music ... 

Once were the heavens a blackness, 

Then blazed a sun forth . . . 

In the Earth's blackness, O tragic struggler, roll forth 

your splendid sun 
Fight darkness with light. 
Destruction with creation. 

Have cities toppled and ships been sunk? 

Build! Build! 

Is youth slain ? 

Beget new children of flesh and toil : 

Beget a new self of splendor ... 

Have hopes died ? 

Kindle new ones . . . 

Has man fallen? 

You, man, arise! 

[ 121 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THREE HILLS 

By Everard Owen 

rpHERE is a hill in England, 
-'" Green fields and a school I know, 
Where the balls fly fast in summer. 

And the whispering elm-trees grow, 

A little hill, a dear hill, 
And the playing-fields below. 

There is a hill in Flanders, 

Heaped with a thousand slain. 

Where the shells fly night and noontide 
And the ghosts that died in vain, 
A little hill, a hard hill 

To the souls that died in pain. 

There is a hill in Jewry, 

Three crosses pierce the sky, 
On the midmost. He is dying 

To save all those who die, 

A little hill, a kind hill 

To souls in jeopardy. 



[ 122 ] 



AUSTRALIA 



AUSTRALIA 

(From "Chants in War") 
By W. S. Pakenham-Walsh 

T N front the steep cliffs loom, 
-*- Shrouded in dreadful gloom, 
Dark with impending doom, 
And silent as the tomb, 
At Krithia. 

But behind, a mother's power, 
Britannia's threatening roar, 
As her children near the shore. 
And her youngest steps to war, 
Australia! 



In front the beetling land. 
The cruel narrow sand, 
Fretted with silver band, 
Festooned with fiendish hand. 
At Gaba Tepe. 

But behind, across the firth, 
The dearest homes on earth, 
Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, 
The land that gave them birth, 
Australia ! 

^ ^ jji ^ ^ ^ 
[ 123 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



In front the victor's crown, 
The glorious welcome home, 
Britannia's great "Well done," 
Or a life laid nobly down. 
At Sari Bair. 

And behind, the great campaign, 
A never dying fame, 
And a new immortal name 
For the land from whence they came, 
Australia ! 



MEN HAVE WINGS AT LAST 

By Josephine Preston Peabody 

"T^rOLF, Wolf-Stay-at-home, 

^ ^ Prowler, — scout, 
Clanless and castaways, 
And ailing with the drought, 
Out from your hidings, — thither to the call; 
Lift up your eyes to the high wind- fall! 
Lift up your eyes from the poisoned spring; 
Overhead, — Overhead! The dragon Thing, 
— WTiat should it bring? 
— Poising on the wing?" 

[ 124 ] 



MEN HAVE WINGS AT LAST 



"Wolf, Wolf, Old One, I saw it, even I. 
Yesterday, yesterday, the Thing came by 
Prowling at the outpost of the last lean wood. 
By the gray waste ashes where the minster stood; 
And out through the cloister where the belfry fronts 
The market-place and the town was once; 
High, — hi^h above the bright wide square 
And the folk all flocking together, unaware. 
The Thing-with-the-wings came there. 

Brother Vulture saw it 

And called me, as it passed: 

"Look and see, look and see, — 

Men have wings at last." 

"By the eyeless belfry I saw it, overhead, 

Poised like a hawk, — like a storm unshed. 

Near the huddled doves there, from the shattered cote, 

I watched to. . . . And it smote ! 

"Not a threat of thunder, — not an armed man, 
Where the fury struck, and the fleet fire ran. — 
But girl-child, man-child, mothers and their young, 
Newborn of woman, with milk upon its tongue; 
Nursling where it clung. 

"Not a talon reached they, yet, the lords of prey! 
But left the red dregs there, rent and cast away; 
Fled from the spoils there, scattered things accurst: 

It was not for hunger; 

It was not for thirst. 

[ 125 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



From the eyeless belfry, 
Brother Vulture laughed: 
"This is all we have to see 
For his master-craft? 
-Old ones, and lean ones, 
Never now to fast. 
Men have wings at last!" 



"Brought they any tidings for us from the Sun?" 

"No, my chief, not one." 
"Left they not a road-sign, how the way was won?" 

"No, my chief, none. 
But girl-child, man-child, creature yet unborn. 
Doe and fawn together so, weltering and torn, 
Newborn of woman where the flag-stones bled; 
(Better can the vultures do, for the shamed dead.) 
Road-dust sobbing where the lightning burst — 

It was not for hunger; 

It was not for thirst." 

"Brought they not some token that the stars look on?" 

"No, my chief, none." 

"Never yet a message from the highways overhead?" 

"Brother, I have said." 

"Old years, gray years, years of growing things. 
We have toiled and kept the watch with our wonderings; 
But to see what thing should be, when that Men had 
Wings. 

[ 126 ] 



MEN HAVE WINGS AT LAST 



"Sea-mark, sea-wall, — ships above the tide; 

Mine and mole-way under-earth, to have its hidden 

pride; — 
Not enough, not enough; more and more beside! 

"Bridle for our proud-of-mane, — then the triple yoke; 
Ox-goad and lash again, and bonded fellow- folk! 
Not enough; not enough; — for his master-stroke. 
Thunder trapped and muttering and led away for thrall; 
Lightnings leashed together then, at his beck and call; 
Not enough; not enough; — for his Wherewithal! 

"He must look with evil eye 
On the spaces of the sky: 
He must scheme, and try! — 
While all we, with dread and awe, 
Sheathing and unsheathing claw, 
Watch apart, and prophesy 
That we never saw. — 

"Wings, to seek his more-and-more 

Where we knew us blind; 

Wings to make him conquer. 

With his master-mind; 

Wings, that he out-watch, — out-soar, 

Eagle and his kind! 

"Lo, the dream fulfilled at last! — And the dread outgrown, 
Broken, as a bird's heart; — fallen as a stone 

... What was he, to make afraid ? 

Hating all that he had made ? 

Hating all his own. 

[ 127 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"Scatter to your strongholds, till the race is run. 

Doe and fawn together, so, soon it will be done. 

Never now, never now. Ship without a mast, 

In the harbors of the Sun, do you make fast! 
But the floods shall cleanse again 
Every blackened trail of Men, — 
Men with wings, at last!" 



HARVEST MOON: 1914 

By Josephine Preston Peabody 

i^VER the twihght field, 

^-^ The overflowing field, — 

Over the glimmering field, 

And bleeding furrows with their sodden yield 

Of sheaves that still did writhe. 

After the scythe; 

The teeming field and darkly overstrewn 

With all the garnered fulness of that noon — 

Two looked upon each other. 

One was a Woman men had called their mother; 

And one, the Harvest Moon. 

And one the Harvest Moon, 

Who stood, who gazed 

On those unquiet gleanings where they bled; 

Till the lone Woman said: 

[ 128 ] 



HARVEST MOON: 1914 



"^'But we were crazed ... 

We should laugh now together, I and you, 

We two. 

You, for your ever dreaming it was worth 

A star's while to look on and light the Earth; 

And I, forever telling to my mind, 

Glory it was, and gladness, to give birth 

To humankind ! 

Yes, I, that ever thought it not amiss 

To give the breath to men, 

For men to slay again: 

Lording it over anguish but to give 

My life, that men might live 

For this. 

You will be laughing now, remembering 

I called you once Dead World, and barren thing, 

Yes, so we named you then. 

You, far more wise 

Than to give life to men." 

Over the field, that there 

Gave back the skies 

A scattered upward stare 

From blank white eyes, — 

The furrowed field that lay 

Striving awhile, through many a bleeding dune 

Of throbbing clay, but dumb and quiet soon, 

She looked; and went her way — 

The Harvest Moon. 



[ 129 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



WOMEN AND WAR 

By Stephen Phtllips 

WOMEN of England, yours how hard the task, 
Service from you how difficult we ask! 
Glorious to stand against the leaden hail, 
In the mown war-line not to flinch or fail! 
Splendid the onrush and the charging cheer, 
Yet glorious too to check the coming tear. 
The doubt by night to stifle, through the day 
The deep alarm not outwardly betray. 
O dull expectancy that finds not vent! 
O silent anguish that will not lament! 
O mad uncertainty from dawn to eve! 
O worse to wait than battle to receive! 
Heroes are ye, who but the sob repress. 
Your victory dumb is victory no less! 

TO A MOTHER 

By Eden Phillpotts 

"D OBBED mother of the stricken Motherland — 

-■- ^ Two hearts in one and one among the dead, 

Before your grave with an uncovered head 

I, that am man, disquiet and silent stand 

In reverence. It is your blood they shed; 

It is your sacred self that they demand. 

For one you bore in joy and hope, and planned 

Would make yourself eternal, now has fled. 

[ 130 ] 



BETWEEN THE LINES 



But tho' you yielded him unto the knife 
And altar with a royal sacrifice 
Of your most precious self and dearer life — 
Your master gem and pearl above all price — 
Content you; for the dawn this night restores 
Shall be the dayspring of his soul and yours. 



BETWEEN THE LINES 

By Charles Alexander Richmond 



r> ESIDE the hollow of the wood— 

'-^ Fresh and sweet is the early green — 

Two sentinels like shadows stood, 

And the night stood round with her somber screen. 

II. 

Into their eyes gray morning crept, 
Crept and caressed the morning breath; 
And there in the leveled rifles slept — 
Slept together — ^Life and Death. 

III. 

The Frenchman lowered — "Kinder?" he said, 
"Mais voila — ^he shall understand." 
The Prussian peasant slowly spread 
The five blunt fingers of his hand. 

[ 131 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



IV. 

''Ja, Filnf. Wie viele haben sie?" 
''Eh! trots." The other told them then 
Nimbly on his fingers three. 
"Schon — wir laujen! Wiedersehen!" 

V. 

A lark burst into melody, 

And laughed and sang so clear and high 

That the sun rose up in his bed to see 

And a smile spread over the face of the sky. 



CHANT OF DEAD WARRIORS 

By Cecil Roberts 

WE came from the ends of the earth to the mother 
who gave to us birth, 
In our eyes leapt the sunshine of mirth, through our veins 

ran the rapture of life! 
We were young and the flame of desire still burned, and 

our hearts were afire, 
Our love was intense, and our ire was swiftly aroused 

for in strife 
We smote without rest, without ruth, with the vigor and 

passion of youth, 
And hated dissemblers of Truth, though our ways with 

disorder were rife. 

[ 132 ] 



CHANT OF DEAD WARRIORS 



In the silence of Death now we lie strangely bound 'neath 

an alien sky, 
Life was good but 'twas better to die in the battle for 

England our Mother! 
She reared us and sent us afar, recalled us and armed us 

for war, 
We heard and we came and we are sleeping now, brother 

with brother; 
'Neath the tide of the battle we rest with the fever of life 

unoppressed, 
Of all ends 'twas the end that was best; what true man 

desired another? 

We flowed as the sea-tides flow, with a roar in the face of 

the foe. 
And smote them with blow upon blow, and they sank 

'neath the furious wave; 
We were swift, we were terrible, strong, and were filled 

with the fury of wrong, 
Invincible, sweeping along, no mercy we sought nor we 

gave; 
Dishonored, they feared us and fell, and the land they 

transformed into hell 
Is avenged, and our death, it was well — for with glory 

we rode to the grave! 



[ 133 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



WATCHMEN OF THE NIGHT 

By Cecil Roberts 

T ORDS of the seas' great wilderness 
-■-^ The Hght-gray war-ships cut the wind; 
The headland dwindles less and less; 

The great waves, breaking, drench and blind 
The stern-faced watcher on the deck, 
While England fades into a speck. 

Afar on that horizon gray 

The sleepy homesteads one by one 
Shine with their cheerful lights as day 

Dies in the valley and is gone, 
While the great moon comes o'er the hill 
And floods the landscape, white and still. 

But outward 'mid the homeless waste 

The battle-fleet held on its way; 
On either side the torn seas raced. 

Over the bridge blew up the spray; 
The quartermaster at the wheel 
Steered through the night his ship of steel. 

Once from a masthead blinked a light — 
The Admiral spoke unto the Fleet; 

Swift answers flashed along the night. 

The chart-house glimmered through the sleet; 

A bell rang from the engine-room, 

And ere it ceased — the great guns' boom! 

- [ 134 ] 



WATCHMEN OF THE NIGHT 



Then thunder through the silence broke 
And rolled along the sullen deep; 

A hundred guns flashed fire and spoke, 

Which England heard not in her sleep 

Nor dreamed of, while her fighting sons 

Fed and fired the blazing guns. 

Dawn broke in England, sweet and clear; 

Birds in the brake, the lark in heaven 
Made musical the morning air; 

But distant, shattered, scorched, and riven, 
Gathered the ships — ay, dawn was well 
After the night's red, raging hell. 

But some came not with break of light, 
Nor looked upon the saffron dawn; 

They keep the watch of endless Night, 
On the soft breast of ocean borne. 

O waking England, rise and pray 

For sons who guard thee night and day! 



[ 135 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS 

By Edmond Rostand 
(Translated by Thomas Walsh) 

nn HEY make it only more immortal still. 
•*■ Tho Vandals mar, yet lives the work of Art, 

Let Phidias witness, and Rodin impart. 
How in these fragments speaks the primal thrill. 
The fortress crumbles on the gunless hill; 

The shrine, tho broken, lives with nobler heart; 
Our eyes, raised wistful where its spires would 
start. 
Find heaven grown lovelier through its shattered grille. 

Let us be grateful. . . . Fate would long withhold 
What Greece could boast of on her hill of gold, 

A Beauty in its outrage sanctified . . . 
Let us be grateful, now the hands upon 

The blundering German cannon would provide 
Their shame forever and our Parthenon! 



IN FRANCE 

(1914) 

By Clinton Scollard 

**TS it well with Henri and Jean and Paul?" 

^ An old bent man to a mother said. 
As they met at morn by a little stall 

Where the baker sold them their loaves of bread. 

[ 136 ] 



THE MADONNA OF TREMONDE 



"Is it well with Henri and Jean and Paul?" 
And the mother bowed as beneath a rod; 

Then she answered, "Aye, it is well with them all. 
Well with them all— they are all with God!" 



THE MADONNA OF TREMONDE 

By Clinton Scollard 

WITHIN a convent in Tremonde 
An image of the Virgin stands 
Serene, with half uplifted hands 
And eyes that seem to look beyond 
The mutability of things; 
Around, war's ruthless ravagings, 
The shattered roof, the crumbling wall, 
Are like a sacrilege malign. 
And yet some power — was it divine? — 
Impalpable, impending there, 
Has spared the image and the shrine 
That cast a glamour over all 
And bid the soul to bow in prayer. 

A miracle, so some would say; 
An omen. Be this as it may! 
The sweet Madonna face inspires 
The thought. Above the conflict fires, 
The hates, the base desires that sway 
The heart of man, God watches still. 
And works toward that diviner day 
When good shall triumph over ill. 

[ 137 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE VALE OF SHADOWS 

By Clinton Scollard 

rriHERE is a vale in the Flemish land, 
-*- A vale once fair to see, 
Where under the sweep of the sky's wide arch, 
Though winter freeze or summer parch, 
The stately poplars march and march. 
Remembering Lombardy. 

Here are men of the Saxon eyes. 

Men of the Saxon heart, 
Men of the fens and men of the Peak, 
Men of the Kentish meadows sleek, 
Men of the Cornwall cove and creek, 

Men of the Dove and Dart. 

Here are men of the kilted clans 

From the heathery slopes that lie 
Where the mists hang gray and the mists hang white, 
And the deep lochs brood 'neath the craggy height, 
And the curlews scream in the moonless night 

Over the hills of Skye. 

Here are men of the Celtic breed. 

Lads of the smile and tear. 
From where the loops of the Shannon flow. 
And the crosses gleam in the even-glow. 
And the halls of Tara now are low. 

And Donegal cliffs are sheer. 

[ 138 ] 



THE VALE OF SHADOWS 



And never a word does one man speak, 

Each in his narrow bed, 
For this is the Vale of Long Release, 
This is the Vale of the Lasting Peace, 
Where wars, and the rumors of wars, shall cease, 

The valley of the dead. 

No more are they than the scattered scud. 

No more than broken reeds. 
No more than shards or shattered glass. 
Than dust blown down the winds that pass. 
Than trampled wefts of pampas-grass 

When the wild herd stampedes. 

In the dusk of death they laid them down 

With naught of murmuring, 
And laughter rings through the House of Mirth 
To hear the vaunt of the high of birth, 
For what are all the kings of earth. 

Before the one great King! 

And what shall these proud war-lords say 

At foot of His mighty throne? 
For there shall dawn a reckoning day. 
Or soon or late, come as it may, 
When those who gave the sign to slay 

Shall meet His face alone. 

. [ 139 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



What, think ye, will their penance be 

Who have wrought this monstrous crime? 

What shall whiten their blood-red hands 

Of the stains of riven and ravished lands ? 

How shall they answer God's stern commands 
At the last assize of Time ? 

For though we worship no vengeance-god 

Of madness and of ire, 
No Presence grim, with a heart of stone, 
Shall they not somehow yet atone? 
Shall they not reap as they have sown 

Of fury and of fire? 

There is a vale in the Flemish land 

Where the lengthening shadows spread 

When day, with crimson sandals shod. 

Goes home athwart the mounds of sod 

That cry in silence up to God 
From the valley of the dead! 

I HAVE A RENDEZVOUS WITH DEATH 

By Alan Seeger 
(Killed July, 1916, in battle at Belloy-en-Santerre) 

T HAVE a rendezvous with Death 

-■■ At some disputed barricade. 

When Spring comes round with rustling shade 

And apple-blossoms fill the air — 

I have a rendezvous with Death 

When Spring brings back blue days and fair. 

[ 140 ] 



ON THE WIRE 



It may be he shall take my hand 

And lead me into his dark land 

And close my eyes and quench my breath — 

It may be I shall pass him still. 

I have a rendezvous with Death 

On some scarred slope of battered hill, 

When Spring comes round again this year 

And the first meadow flowers appear. 

God knows 'twere better to be deep 
Pillowed in silk and scented down, 
Where Love throbs out in blissful sleep. 
Pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, 
Where hushed awakenings are dear. . . . 
But I've a rendezvous with Death 
At midnight in some flaming town, 
When Spring trips north again this year, 
And I to my pledged word am true, 
I shall not fail that rendezvous. 

By permission from "Poems by Alan Seeger." Copyright, 1916, by 
Charles Scribner's Sons. 



ON THE WIRE 

By Robert W. Service 

/^ GOD, take the sun from the sky! 
^^ It's burning me, scorching me up. 
God, can't You hear my cry? 
Water! A poor, little cup! 

[ 141 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



It is laughing, the cursed sun! 

See how it swells and swells 

Fierce as a hundred hells ! 

God, will it never have done? 

It's searing the flesh on my bones; 

It's beating with hammers red 

My eyeballs into my head; 

It's parching my very moans. 

See! It's the size of the sky, 

And the sky is a torrent of fire, 

Foaming on me as I lie 

Here on the wire . . . the wire . . . 

Of the thousands that wheeze and hum 

Heedlessly over my head, 

Why can't a bullet come, 

Pierce to my brain instead — 

Blacken forever my brain, 

Finish forever my pain? 

Here in the hellish glare 

Why must I suffer so? 

Is it God doesn't care? 

Is it God doesn't know? 

Oh, to be killed outright. 

Clean in the clash of the fight! 

That is a golden death. 

That is a boon; but this . . . 

Drawing an anguished breath 

Under a hot abyss, 

[ 142 ] 



ON THE WIRE 



Under a stooping sky 

Of seething, sulphurous fire, 

Scorching me up as I lie 

Here on the wire . . . the wire . 

Hasten, O God, Thy night! 
Hide from my eyes the sight 
Of the body I stare and see 
Shattered so hideously. 
I can't believe that it's mine. 
My body was white and sweet, 
Flawless and fair and fine. 
Shapely from head to feet; 
Oh, no, I can never be 
The thing of horror I see 
Under the rifle fire. 
Trussed on the wire . . . the wire 

Of night and of death I dream; 
Night that will bring me peace, 
Coolness and starry gleam. 
Stillness and death's release: 
Ages and ages have passed — 
Lo! it is night at last. 
Night! but the guns roar out. 
Night! but the hosts attack. 
Red and yellow and black 
Geysers of doom upspout. 
Silver and green and red 
Star-shells hover and spread. 

[ 143 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Yonder off to the right 
Fiercely kindles the fight; 
Roaring near and more near, 
Thundering now in my ear; 
Close to me, close . . . Oh, hark! 
Someone moans in the dark. 
I hear, but I cannot see, 
I hear as the rest retire. 
Someone is caught like me, 
Caught on the wire . . . the wire. 

Again the shuddering dawn. 
Weird and wicked and wan; 
Again, and I've not yet gone. 
The man whom I heard is dead. 
Now I can understand: 
A bullet hole in his head, 
A pistol gripped in his hand. 
Well, he knew what to do, — 
Yes, and now I know too. . . . 

Hark the resentful guns! 
Oh, how thankful am I 
To think my beloved ones 
Will never know how I die! 
I've suffered more than my share; 
I'm shattered beyond repair; 
I've fought like a man the fight. 
And now I demand the right 
(God! how his fingers cling!) 
To do without shame this thing. 

[ 144 ] 



TO THE DEAD 



Good! there's a bullet still; 

Now I'm ready to fire; 

Blame me, God, if You will, 

Here on the wire . . . the wire. . . . 

From "Rhymes of a Red Cross Man" by Robert W. Service, author 
of "The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses" and "Ballads of a 
Cheechako," published by Barse & Hopkins, New York. Copyrighted. 



TO THE DEAD 

By Gerald Caldwell Siordet 
(Killed in action February 9, 191 7) 

O INGE in the days that may not come again 

^^ The sun has shone for us on English fields, 

Since we have marked the years with thanksgiving, 

Nor been ungrateful for the loveliness 

Which is our England, then tho' we walk no more 

The woods together, lie in the grass no more. 

For us the long grass blows, the woods are green, 

For us the valleys smile, the streams are bright, 

For us the kind sun still is comfortable 

And the birds sing; and since your feet and mine 

Have trod the lanes together, climbed the hills, 

Then in the lanes and on the little hills 

Our feet are beautiful for evermore. 

And you — O if I call you, you will come 

Most loved, most lovely faces of my friends 

Who are so safely housed within my heart. 

So parcel of this blessed spirit land 

[ 145 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Which is my own heart's England, so possest 

Of all its ways to walk familiarly 

And be at home, that I can count on you, 

Loving you so, being loved, to wait for me, 

So may I turn me in and by some sweet 

Remembered pathway find you once again. 

Then we can walk together, I with you, 

Or you, or you, along some quiet road. 

And talk the foolish, old, forgivable talk. 

And laugh together; you will turn your head. 

Look as you used to look, speak as you spoke, 

My friend to me, and I your friend to you. 

Only when at the last, by some cross-road. 

Our longer shadows, falling on the grass. 

Turn us back homeward, and the setting sun 

Shines like a golden glory round your head, 

There will be something sudden and strange in you. 

Then you will lean and look into my eyes. 

And I shall see the bright wound at your side, 

And feel the new blood flowing to my heart. 

Your blood, beloved, flowing to my heart. 

And I shall hear you speaking in my ear — 

O not the old, forgivable, foolish talk. 

But flames and exaltations, and desires, 

But hopes, and comprehensions, and resolves, 

But holy, incommunicable things 

That like immortal birds sing in my breast, 

And springing from a fire of sacrifice. 

Beat with bright wings about the throne of God. 



[ 146 ] 



WAR RISKS 



WAR RISKS 

By C. Fox Smith 

" T ET go aft" ... and out she slides, 
■■— ^ Pitching when she meets the tides. 
She for whom our cruisers keep 
Lordly vigil in the deep. . . . 
Sink or swim, lads, war or no. 
Let the poor old hooker go ! 

Soon, hull down, will England's shore. 
Smudged and faint, be seen no more: 
Soon the following gulls return 
Where the friendly dock-lights burn. . . 
Soon the cold stars, climbing high, 
March across the empty sky. . . . 
Empty seas beyond her bow, 
(Lord, she's on her lonesome now!) 

When the white fog, stooping low, 
Folds in darkness friend and foe, . . . 
When the fast great liners creep 
Veiled and silent through the deep, . . . 
When the hostile search-light's eye 
Sweeps across the midnight sky, . . . 
Lord of light and darkness, then 
Stretch Thy wing o'er merchantmen! 

[ 147 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



When the waters known of old 
Death in dreadful shape may hold, 
When the mine's black treachery- 
Secret walks the insulted sea . . . 
(Lest the people wait in vain 
For their cattle and their grain), 
Since Thy name is mercy, then, 
Lord, be kind to merchantmen! 



SAINTE JEANNE OF FRANCE 
191S 

By Marion Couthouy Smith 

O AINTE JEANNE went harvesting in France, 
^^ But ah! what found she there? 
The little streams were running red. 

And the torn fields were bare; 
And all about the ruined towers 

Where once her king was crowned, 
The hurtling ploughs of war and death 

Had scored the desolate ground. 

Sainte Jeanne turned to the hearts of men. 

That harvest might not fail; 
Her sword was girt upon her thigh. 

Her dress was silvern mail; 
And all the war-worn ranks were glad 

To feel her presence shine; 
Her smile was like the mellow sun 

Along that weary line. 

[ 148 ] 



PROSPICE 

She gave her silence to their lips, 

Her visions to their eyes, 
And the quick glory of her sword 

She lent to their emprise; 
The shadow of her gentle hand 

Touched Belgium's burning cross, 
And set the seal of power and praise 

On agony and loss. 

Sainte Jeanne went harvesting in France, 

And oh! what found she there? 
The brave seed of her scattering 

In fruitage everywhere; 
And where her strong and tender heart 

Was broken in the flame, 
She found the very heart of France 

Had flowered to her name. 



PROSPICE 

By Alan Sullivan 

npHE ancient and the lovely land 
-■■ Is sown with death; across the plain 
Ungarnered now the orchards stand, 

The Maxim nestles in the grain. 
The shrapnel spreads a stinging flail 

Where pallid Nuns the cloister trod. 
The air-ship spills her leaden hail; 

But — after all the battles — God. 

[ 149 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Athwart the vineyard's ordered banks, 

Silent the red-rent forms recline, 
And from their stark and speechless ranks 

There flows a richer, ruddier wine; 
While down the lane and through the wall 

The victors writhe upon the sod, 
Nor heed the onward bugle-call; 

But — after all the bugles — God. 

By night the blazing cities flare 

Like mushroom torches in the sky; 
The rocking ramparts tremble ere 

The sullen cannon boom reply. 
And shattered is the temple-spire. 

The vestment trampled on the clod. 
And every altar black with fire; 

But — after all the altars — God. 

And all the prizes we have won 

Are buried in a deadly dust; 
The things we set our hearts upon 

Beneath the stricken earth are thrust; 
Again the Savage greets the sun. 

Again his feet with fury shod. 
Across a world in anguish run; 

But — after all the anguish — God. 

The grim campaign, the gun, the sword, 
The quick volcano from the sea, 

The honor that reveres the word. 
The sacrifice, the agony — 

[ 150 ] 



THE DRUM 



These be our heritage and pride, 

Till the last despot kiss the rod, 
And, with man's freedom purified, 

We mark — behind our triumph — God. 

THE DRUM 

By Edward Forrester Sutton 

'T^ HERE'S a rhythm down the road where the elms 
-■■ overarch 

Of the drum, of the drum. 
There's a glint through the green, there's a column on the 
march. 
Here they come, here they come. 
To the flat resounding clank they are tramping rank on 

rank, 
And the bayonet flashes ripple from the flank to the 
flank. 
"I am rhythm, marching rhythm," says the 
drum. 
"No aid am I desiring of the loud brazen choiring, 
"Of bugle or of trumpet the lilt and the lyring, 
"I'm the slow dogged rhythm, unending, untiring, 

"I am rhythm, marching rhythm," says the 
drum. 
"I am rhythm, dogged rhythm, and the plodders feel 

me with 'em, 
"I'm the two miles an hour that is empire, that is 

power, 
"I'm the slow resistless crawl in the dust-cloud's 
choking pall, 

[ 151 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"I'm the marching days that run from the dawn to 

set of sun, 
"I'm the rifle and the kit and the dragging weight 

of it, 
"I'm the jaws grimly set and the faces dripping 

sweat, 
"I'm the how, why, and when, the Almighty made 
for men," 
Says the rhythm, marching rhythm, of the drum. 
"Did you call my song 'barbaric' ? Did you mutter, 'out 

of date'? 
"When you hear me with the foemen then your cry will 

come too late. 
"Here are hearts a-beating for you, to my pulsing as I 
come, 
"To the rhythm, tramping rhythm, 
"To the rhythm, dogged rhythm, 
"To the dogged, tramping rhythm 
"Of the drum!" 

There's a clashing snarling rhythm down the valley broad 
and ample 
Of the drum, kettledrum, 
There's a low, swelling rumor that is cavalry a-trample, 

Here they come, here they come. 
To the brassy crash and wrangle, to the horseman's clink 

and jangle. 
And the restive legs beneath 'em all a-welter and a-tangle. 
"I am rhythm, dancing rhythm," says the 
drum. 

[ 152 ] 



THE DRUM 



"White and sorrel, roan and dapple, hocks as shiny as 

an apple, 
"Don't they make a splendid showing, ears a-pricking, 

tails a-blowing? 
"Good boys — bless 'em — well they're knowing all my 
tricks to set 'em going 
"To my rhythm, dancing rhythm!" says the 
drum. 
"I am rhythm, clashing rhythm, and the horses feel 

me with 'em. 
"I'm the foray and the raid, I'm the glancing sabre- 
blade. 
"Now I'm here, now I'm there, flashing on the 

unaware. 
"How I scout before the ranks, how I cloud along 

the flanks, 
"How the highway smokes behind me let the faint 

stars tell that find me 
"All night through, all night through, when the 

bridles drip with dew. 
"I'm the labor, toil, and pain, I'm the loss that shall 
be gain," 
Says the rhythm, clashing rhythm, of the drum. 
"Did you speak of 'useless slaughter'? Did you murmur 

'Christian love'? 
"Pray that such as these before you when the war-cloud 

bursts above, 
"With the bridle on the pommel meet the foemen as they 
come, 

[ 153 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"To the rhythm, dashing rhythm, 
"To the rhythm, crashing rhythm, 
"To the crashing, dashing rhythm 
"Of the drum!" 

There's an echo shakes the valley o'er the rhythm deep 

and slow 
Of the drum, of the drum, 
'Tis the guns, the guns a-rolling on the bridges down 

below, 
Here they come, here they come. 
Hark the felloes grind and lumber through the shadows 

gray and umber. 
And the triple spans a-panting up the slope the stones 

encumber. 
With the rhythm, distant rhythm, of the drum. 
"'Tis the long Shapes of Fear that the moonlight silvers 

here, 
"And the jolting limber's weighted with the silent 

cannoneer, 
"'Tis the Pipes of Peace are passing, O ye people, give 

an ear!" 
Says the rhythm, iron rhythm, of the drum. 
"They are rhythm, thunder rhythm, and they do not need 

me with 'em, 
"That can overtone my choir like the bourdon from the 

spire. 
"Avant-garde am I to these Lords of dreadful revelries, 
"Iron Cyclops with an eye to confound the earth and sky. 
"Love and Fear, Love and Fear, neither one but both 

revere, 

[ 154 ] 



THE DRUM 



"And whatever grace ye deal let it be from courts of steel, 
"Set the guns' emplacement then to expound the Law to 
men," 
Says the rhythm, iron rhythm, of the drum. 
"O ye coiners, sentence-joiners, in a fatted, tradesman's 

land, 
"Here's evangel Pentecostal that all nations understand, 
"When they speak before the battle fools and theories 
are dumb!" 
God be with 'em, and the rhythm. 
And the rhythm, iron rhythm. 
And the rolling thunder rhythm 
Of the drum! 

There's a rhythm still and toneless with the wind amid 
the green. 
Of the drum, muffled drum, 
And there's arms reversed, and something 'neath a flag 
that goes between 
As they come, as they come. 
"Just a soldier, nothing more, such as all the ages bore 
"And as time and tide shall bear them till the sun be sere 
and hoar," 
Says the rhythm, muffled rhythm, of the drum. 
"No more am I requiring of the keen brazen lyring 
"Than 'taps' from the bugle — some shots for the firing. 
"Hats off; stand aside; it is all I'm desiring," 

Says the rhythm, muffled rhythm, of the drum. 
"I am rhythm, muffled rhythm; long and deep farewell 
go with him, 

[ 155 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"Hands that bore their portion through tasks our nature 

needs must do, 
"Feet that stepped the ancient rhyme of the battle-march 

of Time. 
"Blood or tribute, steel or gold, still Vae Victis as of old, 
"Stern and curt the message runs taught to sons and sons 

of sons. 
''Chair a canon, would you call? What else are we, one 

and all? 
"Write it thus to close his span: 'Here there lies a fighting 
man'," 
Says the rhythm, muffled rhythm, of the drum. 
"O ye farms upon the hillside and ye cities by the sea, 
"With the laughter of young mothers and the babes about 

the knee, 
"'Tis a heart that once beat for you that is passing, still 
and dumb, 
"To the rhythm, muffled rhythm, 
"To the rhythm, solemn rhythm, 
"To the slow and muffled rhythm 
"Of the drum!" 

THE PIPES OF THE NORTH 

By Edward Forrester Sutton 

1~A O ye hear 'em sternly soundin' through the noises of 
^^ of the street, 

O heart from the heather overseas? 
Do ye leap up to greet 'em, does your pulse skip a beat? 

There's a lad with a plaid and naked knees. 

[ 156 ] 



THE PIPES OF THE NORTH 



Here where all is strange and foreign to the swing of kilt 

and sporran, 
With his head proud and high and a lightin' in his eye, 
He's skirlin' 'em, he's dirlin' 'em, he's blowin' like a 

storm — 
O pipes of the North, O the pibroch pourin' forth, 
You're fierce and loud as Winter but ye make the blood 

run warm! 

All the battle-names of story, all the jewel-names of song 

Down the spate of the clangor swing and reel, 
And the claymores come a-flashin' for a thousand years 
along 
From Can-More to bonnie Charlie and Lochiel. 
Though the high-singin' bugle and the brazen crashin' 

fugue'll — 
With the drum and the fife — ^wake the trampin' lines of 
life. 
But neighin' 'em, and brayin' 'em, and shatterin' all 
the air, 
O pipes of the North, when the legions thunder forth 
There's naught like ye to lift 'em on to death or glory 
there! 

Now he tunes an ancient ditty for the leal Highland lover, 

A rill of the mountain clear and pure. 
How the bee is in the blossom and the peewit passin' over 

And the cloud-shadows chasin' on the moor. 
Hark the carol of the chanter rollickin' a skeltin' canter, 

[ 157 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



And the hum of the drones with their "wind-arisin' " 

tones ! 
He's flightin' 'em, he's kitin' 'em, he's flingin' gay 

and free — 
O pipes of the North, when the reel comes tumblin' forth 
'Tis the breeze amid the bracken or the wavelets on 

the sea! 

Now hark the wrechin' sob of it, the "wild with all 
regret," 
O heart from the heather overseas, 
For the homeland of your fathers, though you've never 
known it yet, 
'Tween Tay and the outer Hebrides. 
O the rugged misty Highlands, O the grim and lonely 

islands, 
And the solemn fir and pine, and the grey tormented 
brine — 
He's trailin' 'em, he's wailin' 'em, to tear your bosom's 
core! 
O pipes of the North, when the long lament goes forth 
No sorrow's left to utter, for the tongue can say no more ! 

Oh, Breton pipes are clear and strong, and Irish pipes 
are sweet 
And soft upon the heather overseas. 
But Scottish aye can take your throat or make ye swing 
your feet, 
O hark the lad a-paddlin' on the keys ! 

[ 158 ] 



THE TRUMPET 



See him footin' straight and proud through the wonder- 

gawkin's crowd, 
With his feathered Glengarry like a gun at the carry; 
He's bellin' 'em, he's yellin' 'em, he's skirlin' high 

to you — 
O pipes of the North, O the wild notes rushin' forth, 
Ye're sure the wings of Gaelic souls as far as blood is true! 



THE TRUMPET 

By Rabindranath Tagore 

THE trumpet lies in the dust. 
The wind is weary, the light is dead. Ah, the evil 
day! 
Come fighters, carrying your flags and singers with your 

songs. 
Come pilgrims, hurrying on your journey! 
The trumpet lies in the dust waiting for us. 

I was on my way to the temple with my evening offerings. 
Seeking for the heaven of rest after the day's dusty toil; 
Hoping my hurts would be healed and stains in my 

garments washed white. 
When I found thy trumpet lying in the dust. 

Has it not been the time for me to light my lamp? 

Has my evening not come to bring me sleep ? 

O, thou blood-red rose, where have my poppies faded ? 

[ 159 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



I was certain my wanderings were over and my debts all 

paid 
When suddenly I came upon the trumpet lying in the dust. 

Strike my drowsy heart with thy spell of youth! 

Let my joy in life blaze up in fire. 

Let the shafts of awakening fly piercing the heart of night 

and a thrill of dread shake the palsied blindness, 
I have come to raise thy trumpet from the dust. 

Sleep is no more for me — my walk shall be through 

showers of arrows, 
Some shall run out of their houses and come to my side — 

some shall weep, 
Some in their beds shall toss and groan in dire dreams: 
For to-night thy trumpet shall be sounded. 

From thee I had asked peace only to find shame. 
Now I stand before thee — help me to don my armor! 
Let hard blows of trouble strike fire into my life. 
Let my heart beat in pain — beating the drum of thy 

victory, 
My hands shall be utterly emptied to take up thy trumpet. 

Reprinted by permission from "Fruit Gathering" by Rabindranath 
Tagore. Copyright, 1916, by The Macmillan Company, 



[ 160 ] 



THE WOMAN'S CRY 



THE WOMAN'S CRY 

By Edith M. Thomas 

All the posters were printed in red. "Red!" cried the women, and 
there was some weeping among them; but the men for the most part 
took it quietly, seriously, and with sad submissiveness. — St. Petersburg 

Newspaper. 

*'T> ED!" cried the women by the Neva's tide . . . 

^^ And what they're crying by the Neva's tide 
They're crying, too, in France, the Beautiful, 
And 'neath the lindens of the Fatherland. 
And farther yet, on ancient Danube's banks! 
What boots it that you cry, O woman-souls. 
Your strong ones going hence — (I mark it well 
In "sad submissiveness" they're going hence!) 
Your strong ones are a herd; the lash is swung 
And dumb they go — they dream no other way! 

"Red!" cried the women. I cry, too, — in vain . . . 
I know what I would do, if but my wit 
Equaled my swelling heart — and if my tongue 
The Pentecostal gift of tongues might seize — 
Not speech of courts, nor sinuous subtle phrase. 
But peasant power of straight appeal to hearts. 
Words like to glowing coals that neighbors pass 
From heart to heart — words like the ringing ax 
When the arm swings it through the heart of oak, 
Words like the fervid ploughshare, driven deep — 
Might I but speak their native speech to them, 

[ 161 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



In some four countries of this world, gone mad, 
The children of the soil should hear me cry: — 
Now, wherefore are ye driven forth to War? 
Ye have not made it, and ye hate no man. 

That ye would go to hunt him to his death 
(He hunting you) — ^yet bearing you no hate! 
Stand in your fields, your shops, and do not go! 
Be ye not "mobilized" but stand like stones; 
And if to prison ye be haled, and if 
They rain upon your hearts their leaden rain 
Because ye will not serve, stand till ye fall! 
Ye can but die — but so, die innocent. 
Having, yourselves, slain no man innocent! 
So, fall, the protomartyrs Who Fought War, 
Glorious and sacred on the lips of men 
Who shall be, and their heritage Your Peace! 
"Red!" cried the women. Let them cry no more. 



A VISION OF SPRING 

(Late Winter, 1915) 

By RiDGELY TORRENCE 

T N the night, at the sound of winter thunder, 
^ As I brooded upon my wounded planet 
From my country beyond the reddened waters. 
All my thoughts were at once of spring returning. 
Broken rain from the gulf upon my window 
Passed down shadowy ways and there was silence. 

[ 162 ] 



A VISION OF SPRING 



Out of quietness light arose within me 
Shedding luminous magic on the darkness; 
Moon on moon from a cloud of vanished Aprils 
Lit my heart with a dream of springs remembered. 
Unborn beauty in flowers not yet risen 
Waved before me in bright immortal pastures 
Till alone of the year's four worlds of wonder 
Spring seemed tender and I forgot the others. 
Only spring could assuage my grieving planet 
Scourged with graves of the young men darkly fallen 
In long harrowing straightness on the meadows. 
None seemed healing beside the blossom season; 
When grass rises again (I thought) these furrows 
Will lie hidden forever under beauty; 
On each sleeper a loveliness arising 
Soon shall cover his deep unwhispered trouble, 
None will signal of anguish from these trenches, 
None find sorrow among the roots of roses; 
One thing only is needed, rainbowed springtime; 

Peace flows out of it, all its ways are peaceful. 
So I longed for the time of apple blossoms. 
All my dreams were upon the blowing lilacs. 

But some whirlwind that held the winter's secret 
Rose and lifting the frozen days as curtains 
Showed me Time as an upper sky of crystal 
Flushed with images yet to be reflected. 

[ 163 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



There past lightnings I saw the coming season 
Fill with shapes of the things to be unfolded; 
But no healing was there; I saw none solaced, 
Saw no comfort uplifted by the snowdrop. 
Nothing beautiful rose but close above it 
Shadows thwarted its mercy for the gazer. 

By the crocus and by the valley-lily 

Stood the sorrowful, stood the broken-hearted. 

There they drank who had thirsted from the autumn 

Bitter widowings poured among the gardens. 

By the rivers were trystings kept with ashes. 

There I saw but I could not reach the children 

Turned from happiness, looking to the trenches; 

Saw them taste of the grindings of false anger. 

Saw behind them the granite eyes of hunger, 

Saw things terrible born among the roses. 

All was barren as ever in the winter, 
Earth embattled against the mourning heavens, 
One star warring against the many lonely. 
Nothing comforted, nothing unendangered. 

And I thought that I heard the spring cry round me. 

All about me the voice of springtime crying: 

"I am barren, barren, for Love has left me, 

I am nothing without his breath to warm me. 

My beloved was mine among the lilies. 

Timeless dawnings before these heavens gathered. 

There he found me and sealed me with his kisses. 

There I gave him the worlds unstained, unwarring. 

[ 164 ] 



A VISION OF SPRING 



But earth's children, the wilful children scorned him 

Whom I call and desire until the daybreak. 

I fly sorrowful then until his coming, 

I pour solace to none of all the mournful, 

Till earth's children, the children sad receive him. 

I have sorrow, sorrow, till Love's returning." 

Then at last from a deep behind the whirlwind 
One still wisdom arose and shook my spirit 
And I knew, if the golden spring comes loveless. 
Earth shall moan but the bitter moons flow empty. 

Though old mockeries plant the thorny truces. 
All the fruitage of steel repose has fallen. 
Love comes weaponless, all-forgiving, tender, 
Olive-filleted for the peace enduring. 

O, that endlessly earth would stream the heavens 
With one music of all-assenting welcome. 
Strong, miraculous then would spring reveal him. 
Swift Love walking on the wavings of the crocus. 
Holding tenderly, holding safe the broken. 

Dove-low waters among the kindled willows 
Then would lift to anoint a dust unsaddened, 
Piercing cries of the spirit from the marshes 
Melt with chorusings sweet upon the hillsides. 
Harplike mysteries called through glowing orchards, 
Shy, invisible laughters from the thickets. 
All that uttered the dream while earth turned heedless 
Then with freshets of song would cool its fever. 

[ 165 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Unbelievably then would Love inhabit 

All green places within the heart, outpouring 

Spring with thunder of all her myriad fountains 

In one cup for the healing of the nations. 

Till in visionings all, as on a mountain, 

Would with trembling above the fallen blindness 

Look on Love and discern him as the sunlight. 

Rayed with dreams, and above the treading glory 

Out of opening heavens the dove descending. 



TO MY COUNTRY 

By Charles Hanson Towne 

ONE told me he had heard it whispered: "Lol 
The hour has come when Europe, desperate 
With sudden war and terrible swift hate. 
Rocks like a reed beneath the mighty blow. 

"Therefore shall we, in this her time of woe. 
Profit and prosper, since her ships of state 
Go down in darkness. Kind, thrice kind is Fate, 

Leaving our land secure, our grain to grow!" 

America! They blaspheme and they lie 

Who say these are the voices of your sons! 

In this foul night, when nations sink and die. 
No thought is here save for the fallen ones 
Who, underneath the ruin of old thrones. 

Suffer and bleed, and tell the world good-by! 

[ 166 ] 



IN WAR-TIME 



HIGH SUMMER 

By Katharine Tynan 

"piNKS and syringa in the garden closes, 
-*■ And the sweet privet hedge and golden roses, 
The pines hot in the sun, the drone of the bee, 
They die in Flanders to keep these for me. 

The long sunny days and the still weather, 
The cuckoo and blackbird shouting together, 
The lambs calling their mothers out on the lea. 
They die in Flanders to keep these for me. 

All doors and windows open; the South wind blowing 
Warm through the clean sweet rooms on tiptoe going. 
Where many sanctities, dear and delightsome, be. 
They die in Flanders to keep these for me. 

Daisies leaping in foam on the green grasses, 

The dappled sky and the stream that sings as it passes; 

These are bought with a price, a bitter fee. 

They die in Flanders to keep these for me. 

IN WAR-TIME 

By Katharine Tynan 

IVfOW strikes the hour upon the clock, 
-^^ The black sheep may rebuild the years; 
May lift the father's pride he broke, 
And wipe away his mother's tears. 

[ 167 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



To him, the mark for thrifty scorn, 
God hath another chance to give, 

Sets in his heart a flame new-born 

By which his muddied soul may live. 

This is the day of the prodigal, 

The decent people's shame and grief; 

When he shall make amends for all — 
The way to glory's bloody and brief. 

Clean from his baptism of blood. 

New from the fire he springs again. 

In shining armor, bright and good, 

Beyond the wise home-keeping men. 

Somewhere to-night — no tears be shed! 

With shaking hands they turn the sheet, 
To find his name among the dead, 

Flower of the Army and the Fleet. 

They tell with proud and stricken face 
Of his white boyhood far away — 

Who talked of trouble or disgrace? 

"Our splendid son is dead!" they say. 



[ 168 ] 



A NIGHT PIECE 



A NIGHT PIECE 

By Katharine Tynan 

rilHE little houses lie asleep, 
-■- The sheep and lambs are folded in, 
Winged sentinels the valley keep, 

Through the white night from grief and sin. 

The babe is at its mother's breast. 

The children, with their prayers all said, 

Are folded in a rosy nest. 

Love's wings o'er every drowsy head. 

St. Patrick and St. Bridget watch 
Above each little sleeping farm. 

Lest a foe's hand be at the latch; 

Here there is naught to do them harm. 

St. Brendan and St. Kevin, pluck 

The robe of God that He may hear. 

And Columb, keep the Irish flock 

From wolves and tigers prowling near. 

What news, then, of the Belgians, say? — 
How fare the village and the town? — 

Oh, Belgium smokes by night and day, 
And all her towers are toppling down. 

Oh, where are Belgium's angels flown 
And are the Belgian Saints asleep, 

That in this night, cold as a stone. 

The Belgians mourn, the Belgians weep ? 

[ 169 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



MY SON 

By Ada Tyrrell 

T TERE is his little cambric frock 

-*- -■■ That I laid by in lavender so sweet, 

And here his tiny shoe and sock 

I made with loving care for his dear feet. 

I fold the frock across my breast, 

And in imagination, ah, my sweet, 
Once more I hush my babe to rest. 

And once again I warm those little feet. 

Where do those strong young feet now stand ? 

In flooded trench, half numb to cold and pain, 
Or marching through the desert sand 

To some dread place that they may never gain. 

God guide him and his men to-day! 

Tho' death may lurk in any tree or hill. 
His brave young spirit is their stay; 

Trusting in that they'll follow where he will. 

They love him for his tender heart 

When poverty or sorrow asks his aid. 

But he must see each do his part — 
Of cowardice alone he is afraid. 

I ask no honors on the field, 

That other men have won as brave as he — 
I only pray that God may shield 

My son, and bring him safely back to me! 

[ 170 ] 



THE LAUGHERS 



THE LAUGHERS 

By Louis Untermeyer 

OPRING! 

^ And her hidden bugles up the street. 

Spring — and the sweet 

Laughter of winds at the crossing; 

Laughter of birds and a fountain tossing 

Its hair in abandoned ecstasies. 

Laughter of trees. 

Laughter of shop-girls that giggle and blush; 

Laugh of the tug-boat's impertinent fife. 

Laughter followed by a trembling hush — 

Laughter of love, scarce whispered aloud. 

Then, stilled by no sacredness or strife. 

Laughter that leaps from the crowd; 

Seizing the world in a rush. 

Laughter of life. ... 

Earth takes deep breaths like a man who had feared he 

might smother. 
Filling his lungs before bursting into a shout . . . 
Windows are opened — curtains flying out; 
Over the wash-lines women call to each other. 
And, under the calling, there surges, too clearly to doubt, 
Spring, with the noises 
Of shrill, little voices; 
Joining in "Tag" and the furious chase 
Of "I-spy," "Red Rover" and "Prisoner's Base"; 

[ 171 ] ' , 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Of the roller-skates' whir at the sidewalk's slope, 

Of boys playing marbles and the girls skipping rope. 

And there, down the avenue, behold, 

The first true herald of the Spring — 

The hand-organ gasping and wheezily murmuring 

Its tunes ten years old. ... 

And the music, trivial and tawdry, has freshness and 

magical swing. 
And over and under it. 
During and after — 
The laughter 
Of Spring ! . , . 

And lifted still 

With the common thrill 

With the throbbing air, the tingling vapor, 

That rose like strong and mingled wines; 

I turn to my paper. 

And read these lines: 

"Now that the Spring is here, 

The war enters its bloodiest phase. . . . 

The men are impatient. . . . 

Bad roads, storms and the rigors of the winter 

Have held back the contending armies. . . . 

But the recruits have arrived. 

And are waiting only the first days of warm weather . . . 

There will be terrible fighting along the whole line — 

Now that Spring has come." 

[ 172 ] 



THE LAUGHERS 



I put the paper down. . . . 
Something struck out the sun — something unseen; 
Something arose Hke a dark wave to drown 
The golden streets with a sickly green. 
Something polluted the blossoming day 
With the touch of decay. 

The music thinned and died; 

People seemed hollow-eyed. 

Even the faces of children, where gaiety lingers, 

Sagged and drooped like banners about to be furled — 

And Silence laid its bony fingers 

On the lips of the world. . . . 

A grisly quiet with the power to choke; 

A quiet that only one thing broke ; 

One thing alone arose up thereafter. . . . 

Laughter ! 

Laughter of streams running red. 

Laughter of evil things in the night; 

Vultures carousing over the dead; 

Laughter of ghouls. 

Chuckling of idiots, cursed with sight. 

Laughter of dark and horrible pools. 

Scream of the bullets' rattling mirth, 

Sweeping the earth. 

Laugh of the cannon's poisonous breath . . . 

And over the shouts and the wreckage and crumbling 

The raucous and rumbling 

Laughter of death. 

Death that arises to sing, — 

Hailing the Spring! 

[ 173 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



THE VICTORY OF THE BEET FIELDS 

By Louis Untermeyer 

[Note : The italicized middle stanzas are an almost literal transcription 
from a letter received from one in the trenches.] 

GREEN miles of leafy peace are spread 
Over these ranks, unseen and serried; 
Screening the trenches with their dead 
And living men already buried. 
The rains beat down, the torrents flow 
Into each cold and huddling cave; 
And over them the beet-fields grow, 
A fortress gentle as a grave. 

"Morose, impatient, sick at heart, 

With rasping nerves and twitching muscles, 

We cannot even sleep; we start 

With every twig that snaps or rustles. 

Sought ever by an unseen joe. 

Over our heads the bullets fly; 

But more than these, we fear the snow. 

The silent shrapnel of the sky. 

''Yonder our colonel stalks and grieves. 
Meeting the storm with thoughts more stormy: 
But we, we sit and watch the leaves 
Fall down, a torn and crumpled army. 
We mourn for every leaf that lies. 
As though it were a comrade slain; 
Each was a shelter from the eyes 
Of every prying aeroplane." 

[ 174 ] 



ENGLAND TO THE SEA 



And in its cloudy uniform 

Stilling the cannon's earthly thunder, 

The huge artillery of the storm 

Plows through the land and pulls it under, 

The rain beats down, until the slow 

And slipping earth resists no more — 

^nd over them the beets will grow 

Ranker and redder than before. 

ENGLAND TO THE SEA 

By R. E. Vernede 

HEARKEN, O Mother, hearken to thy daughter! 
Fain would I tell thee what men tell to me, 
Saying that henceforth no more on any water 
Shall I be first or great or loved or free. 

But that these others — so the tale is spoken — 
Who have not known thee all these centuries 

By fire and sword shall yet turn England broken 

Back from thy breast and beaten from thy seas, 

Me — whom thou barest where thy waves should guard me, 
Me — whom thou suckled'st on thy milk of foam. 

Me — whom thy kisses shaped what while they marred me. 
To whom thy storms are sweet and ring of home. 

"Behold," they cry, "she is grown soft and strengthless. 
All her proud memories changed to fear and fret." 

Say, thou, who hast watched through ages that are 
lengthless. 
Whom have I feared, and when did I forget? 

[ 175 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



What sons of mine have shunned thy whorls and races? 

Have I not reared for thee time and again 
And bid go forth to share thy fierce embraces 

Sea-ducks, sea-wolves, sea-rovers, and sea-men? 

Names that thou knowest — great hearts that thou holdest, 
Rocking them, rocking them in an endless wake — 

Captains the world can match not with its boldest, 

Hawke, Howard, Grenville, Frobisher and Drake? 

Nelson — the greatest of them all — the master 
Who swept across thee like a shooting star. 

And, while the Earth stood veiled before disaster. 

Caught Death and slew him — there — at Trafalgar? 

Mother, they knew me then as thou didst know me; 

Then I cried, Peace, and every flag was furled: 
But I am old, it seems, and they would show me 

That never more my peace shall bind the world. 

Wherefore, O Sea, I, standing thus before thee. 

Stretch forth my hands unto thy surge and say: 

"When they come forth who seek this empire o'er thee, 
And I go forth to meet them — on that day 

"God grant to us the old Armada weather. 

The winds that rip, the heavens that stoop and lour — 
Not till the Sea and England sink together. 

Shall they be masters ! Let them boast that hour ! " 

R. E. Vernede was killed in action in France, April p, 1(117. 



[ 176 ] 



w 



GOD AND THE STRONG ONES 
GOD AND THE STRONG ONES 

By Margaret Widdemer 



E have made them fools and weak!" said the 
Strong Ones: 

"We have bound them, they are dumb and deaf and Wind, 
We have crushed them in our hands Hke a heap of 
crumbling sands. 
We have left them naught to seek or find: 
They are quiet at our feet!" said the Strong Ones, 

"We have made them one with wood and stone and 
clod; 
Serf and laborer and woman, they are less than wise or 
human! — " 
"/ shall raise the weak," saith God. 



"They are stirring in the dark!" said the Strong Ones, 
"They are struggling, who were moveless like the 
dead. 
We can hear them cry and strain hand and foot against 
the chain. 
We can hear their heavy upward tread — 
What if they are restless?" said the Strong Ones, 
"What if they have stirred beneath the rod? 
Fools and weak and blinded men, we can tread them 
down again — " 
''Shall ye conquer Me?" saith God. 

[ 177 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



"They are evil and are brutes!" said the Strong Ones, 

"They are ingrates of the ease and peace we give, 
We have stooped to them in grace and they mock us to 
our face — 

How shall we give light to them and live ? 
They are all unworthy grace!" said the Strong Ones, 

"They that cowered at our lightest look and nod — " 
"This that now ye pause and weigh of your grace may 
prove one day 

Mercy that ye need!" saith God. 

"They will trample us and bind!" said the Strong Ones: 
"We are crushed beneath the blackened feet and 
hands ! 
All the strong and fair and great they will crush from 
out the State, 
They will whelm it like the weight of pressing 
sands — 
They are maddened and are blind!" said the Strong Ones, 

"Black decay has come where they have trod — 
They will break the world in twain if their hands are on 
the rein — " 
"What is that to Me?" saith God. 

"Ye have made them in their strength, who were Strong 
Ones, 
Ye have only taught the blackness ye have known; 
These are evil men and blind? Ay, but molded to your 
mind! 
How can ye cry out against your own? 

[ 178 ] 



THE OLD ROAD TO PARADISE 



Ye have held the light and beauty I have given 

Far above the muddied ways where they must plod, 

Ye have builded this your lord with the lash and with 
the sword — 
Reap what ye have sown!" saith God. 



THE OLD ROAD TO PARADISE 

By Margaret Widdemer 

t~\ URS is a dark Eastertide, and a scarlet spring, 
^-^ But high up at Heaven's gate all the saints sing, 
Glad for the great companies returning to their King! 

Oh, in youth the dawn's a rose, dusk an amethyst, 

All the roads from dusk to dawn gay they wind and twist, 

The old road to Paradise, easy it is missed! 

But out in the wet battlefields few the roadways wind, 
One to grief, one to death — no road that's kind — 
The old road to Paradise, plain it is to find. 

(5^. Martin in his Colonel's cloak, St. Joan in her mail. 
King David with his crown and sword — oh, none there 

be that fail — 
Along the road to Paradise they stand to greet and hail!) 

Where the dark's a terror-thing, morn a hope doubt- 
tossed. 
Where the lads lie thinking long, out in rain and frost. 
There they find their God again, long ago they lost. 

[ 179 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Where the night comes cruelly, where the hurt men moan, 
Where the crushed, forgotten ones whisper prayers alone, 
Christ along the battlefields comes to lead His own. 

Souls that would have withered soon in the world's hot 

glare, 
Blown and gone like shriveled things, dusty on the air, 
Rank on rank they follow Him, young and strong and 

fair! 

Ours is a sad Eastertide, and a woeful day, 

Yet high up at Heaven's gate the saints are all gay. 

For the old road to Paradise — 'tis a main traveled way! 



SONNETS WRITTEN IN THE FALL OF 1914 

By George Edward Woodberry 
III. 

TTEARKEN, the feet of the Destroyer tread 
■^ -■- The wine-press of the nations; fast the blood 

Pours from the side of Europe; in full flood 
On the septentrional watershed 
The rivers of fair France are running red! 
England, the mother-eyrie of our brood, 
That on the summit of dominion stood. 
Shakes in the blast: heaven battles overhead! 

[ 180 ] 



SONNETS WRITTEN IN THE FALL OF 19 14 



Lift up thy head, O Rheims, of ages heir 

That treasured up in thee their glorious sum; 

Upon whose brow, prophetically fair, 

Flamed the great morrow of the world to come; 

Haunt with thy beauty this volcanic air 

Ere yet thou close, O Flower of Christendom! 

IV. 

As when the shadow of the sun's eclipse 

Sweeps on the earth, and spreads a spectral air. 

As if the universe were dying there, 
On continent and isle the darkness dips. 
Unwonted gloom, and on the Atlantic slips; 

So in the night the Belgian cities flare 

Horizon-wide; the wandering people fare 
Along the roads, and load the fleeing ships. 

And westward borne that planetary sweep. 

Darkening o'er England and her times to be, 

Already steps upon the ocean-deep! 

Watch well, my country, that unearthly sea. 

Lest when thou thinkest not, and in thy sleep. 
Unapt for war, that gloom enshadow thee! 

V. 

I pray for peace; yet peace is but a prayer. 

How many wars have been in my brief years! 

All races and all faiths, both hemispheres, 
My eyes have seen embattled everywhere 

[ 181 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



The wide earth through; yet do I not despair 
Of peace, that slowly through far ages nears, 
Though not to me the golden morn appears; 

My faith is perfect in time's issue fair. 

For man doth build on an eternal scale, 

And his ideals are framed of hope deferred; 

The millennium came not; yet Christ did not fail, 
Though ever unaccomplished is His word; 

Him Prince of Peace, though unenthroned, we hail, 
Supreme when in all bosoms He be heard. 



VI. 

This is my faith, and my mind's heritage. 
Wherein I toil, though in a lonely place. 
Who yet world-wide survey the human race 

Unequal from wild nature disengage 

Body and soul, and life's old strife assuage; 

Still must abide, till heaven perfect its grace, 
And love grown wisdom sweeten in man's face, 

Alike the Christian and the heathen rage. 

The tutelary genius of mankind 

Ripens by slow degrees the final State, 

That in the soul shall its foundations find 
And only in victorious love grow great; 

Patient the heart must be, humble the mind, 
That doth the greater births of time await! 

[ 182 ] 



THE MEN OF THE "EMDEN" 



VII. 

Whence not unmoved I see the nations form 
From Dover to the fountains of the Rhine, 
A hundred leagues, the scarlet battle-line, 

And by the Vistula great armies swarm, 

A vaster flood; rather my breast grows warm. 
Seeing all peoples of the earth combine 
Under one standard, with one countersign. 

Grown brothers in the universal storm. 

And never through the wide world yet there rang 

A mightier summons! O Thou who from the side 

Of Athens and the loins of Caesar sprang, 

Strike, Europe, with half the coming world allied. 

For those ideals for which, since Homer sang, 
The hosts of thirty centuries have died. 



THE MEN OF THE "EMDEN" 
By Thomas R. Ybarra 

WHAT matter if you 
Be stanch and true 
To the British blood in the veins of you. 

When it's "hip hurrah!" for a deed well done, 
For a fight well fought and a race well run — 
What matter if you be true? 
Hats off to the Emden's crew. 

[ 183 ] 



VERSE OF THE GREAT WAR 



Theirs was the life of the storm-god's folk, 

Uncounted miles from the Fatherland, 
With a foe beneath every wisp of smoke, 

And a menace in every strip of strand. 
Up, glasses! Paul Jones was but one of these, 

Hull, Bainbridge, Decatur, their brothers, too! 

(Ha! those pirate nights 

In a ring of foes, 
When you douse your lights 

And drive home your blows!) 

Hats off to the Emden's crew! 

Erect on the wave-washed decks stood they 

And heard with a viking's grim delight 
The whir of the wings of death by day 

And the voice of death in their dreams by night! 
Under the sweep of the wings of death, 
By the blazing gun, in the tempest's breath, 

While a world of enemies strove and fumed, 

Remote, unaided, undaunted, doomed, 
They stood — is there any, friend or foe, 

Who will choke a cheer? — who can still but scoff? 

No, no, by the gods of valor, no! 

To the Emden's crew — 
Hats off! 



[ 184 ] 



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